Degrees Below Zero
by Nuclear Eggs
Summary: Ia is fine being by herself. After all, it's harder to get hurt if she is. The flip side of that is that it's hard for her to be loved as well. Ia/ Yukari, high school AU
1. Chapter 1

Ia hated being touched.

She wasn't sure why. This wasn't a problem that she was unaware of either - this was something she spent a lot of time thinking about. At night, Ia would lay there in bed and ponder. She could come up with a lot of things - maybe her parents, working and busy as they were, just weren't affectionate enough so Ia never got used to it, or maybe it was because they got divorced, or whatever, but the reasons all sounded false to Ia's ears. In especially dark moods, Ia would wonder if she was just fundamentally broken, if her quietness and social anxiety was something intrinsically wrong with her.

After all, no one else seemed to have the same issue. Other people dealt with it fine. They hugged, cuddled, and did all sorts of touchy, social things. Ia would watch them sometimes and envy them - envy that easy sense of social interaction that came so normally to people.

It should come as no surprise that Ia removed herself utterly from her school's social ecosystem. People, as though sensing something off about her, generally tended to keep away. And that was just fine with Ia. She had observed enough of her peers to know that with attachment came pain and drama. Ia didn't need any of that to distract her from important things in life, like studies or music. Other people had their soap opera squabbles and immature little arguments - Ia had her singing, her mixes, her music, and she was fine with that.

Other people were irrelevant. This was something Ia firmly believed. She was her own island. She didn't need anyone else, and that, Ia thought, was that.

-o-o-o-

The streets were brimming full for a small town like Yamaha, and on her way to school, Ia had to squeeze past several groups of students complaining about the start of yet another school year. Ia couldn't really blame them - the weather was warm and balmy, a lazy late summer morning. Part of Ia just wanted to go home, crawl under her blankets, and go back to sleep.

Not that she could do that, of course, so instead Ia put on her headphones, drowned out the noise, and walked quickly to school. Her classroom was mostly empty when she got there, and Ia walked to her seat and sat down. No one acknowledged her as she did, and Ia didn't care. She had grown too used to being excluded to feel the sting. She read a book until class started, and her teacher, a nervous-looking brown-haired man, wrote his name on the board - Hiyama Kiyoteru - and cleared his throat.

"Along with a new school year," he began, "we have a new transfer student as well."

At that, the classroom immediately hushed, and heads turned towards the closed classroom door with interest. Transfer students were extremely rare in this small town. Even Ia looked over at the door, a little curious despite herself to see whoever this newcomer would be.

Through the door walked a self-assured girl with cheery purple eyes and dark hair, her skin pale. She wasn't wearing the prescribed school uniform, instead wearing some black and purple bunny hoodie. She looked pretty and cheerful...the kind of girl who would blend in easily with the classroom and make a lot of friends.

"Um...hi everyone," said the girl, her voice perky and energetic. Too perky and energetic for the morning. "My name is Yuzuki Yukari. I hope I have fun here!"

"You can have the seat next to, hm..." Kiyoteru cast his eyes across the room, "Piko."

Yukari nodded and smiled before walking over and taking the seat next to Piko. The teacher waited for them to finish exchanging greetings and then the class begun. Ia listened for a few moments, but the material was all review, boring stuff she already learned before, so sighing Ia returned her attention to her book.

Eventually, lunch, as it always did, came.

A transfer student's choice of who to spend their lunch with on the first day is one that is crucially important. It usually determined who the transfer student would hang out with, which clique she or he would associate with. To Ia's utter unsurprise, the transfer chose to hang out with Piko, who hung out with Oliver, who in turn was friends with Sonika, who was friends with Gumi, who was, if not friends, acquaintances with almost everyone else in the room. It was an intelligent choice, Ia supposed.

So for Ia, nothing changed and nothing would change. She ate her lunch, alone, as everyone else laughed around her.

-o-o-o-

"You didn't come to school today," Ia remarked as she dropped her backpack on the floor and kicked off her shoes.

Her stepsister, Mayu, shrugged as she sat in front of the television, watching something about steampunk vampires. "I was sick."

"No you weren't," said Ia automatically. That was Mayu's default response for everything.

Mayu sighed melodramatically. "Fine. I was working on some new plushies." She held them up for display. One of them was of a cute rabbit with an axe inexplicably in its head. The other was a white, furry cat with some kind of weird expression stuck halfway between a scream and a smirk.

Ia decided not to comment and turned towards the kitchen. "Do you want some tea?"

"Sure!" Mayu perked up. "What kind?"

"Um," Ia studied the labels on the containers of tea, "what kind do you want?"

"I want some royal milk tea."

"...royal milk tea? What is that?"

"Oh, Ia, Ia, Ia," sighed Mayu, shaking her head with a melancholy expression, "you have so much to learn."

"I'm a year older than you," Ia pointed out.

"Age is nothing next to experience. Royal milk tea is when the milk is boiled along with the water and tea leaves. Haven't you ever been to a tea shop? Oh, wait," Mayu paused and frowned, "I forget that all you do is stay in your room and listen to music. You should come with me sometime."

"No thanks," Ia said automatically as she took out the requisite ingredients.

Mayu scowled at her, hugging her bunny plush closer to herself. "You need to get out more, Ia!" She pointed an accusing finger at her. "You're older than me, so you have to set an example."

Ia shook her head. "I set enough of an example by going to school. Anyways, there's a new transfer student in my class today-"

"I know!" Mayu bounced up to her feet, eyes suddenly bright. "I heard. Yuzuki Yukari, right? Hmm," Mayu placed a finger to her lips, eyes thoughtful. "Her name sounds nice. Yu and Yu. And they both end with 'i' sounds. I wonder why she moved here to the middle of nowhere, though."

Ia blinked. "How did you know about her already?"

"Ah, my friends told me," Mayu said, falling back on the couch. "Yamaha is so small, everyone knows about her."

Ia raised her eyebrows. One of the benefits of having friends, she supposed. Shrugging, she turned back towards the stove and began to make the tea.

-o-o-o-

The days passed, ordinary and slow. The transfer student seemed nicely settled into her life at school, sitting with Piko and his friends at lunch, laughing frequently. Despite herself, Ia was a little amazed - the transfer made friends so easily, unlike Ia, who never had any friends. But that was fine. Ia was too busy. She wasn't lonely; she just had no time for things like 'friends', and she was too used to her solitary lifestyle. It was a little comforting, the monotony of it all.

But all of that changed the day Yukari marched over to Ia's desk at lunch, sat down next to her, and started taking out her lunch.

Ia looked up from her book and stared at Yukari in complete confusion. What? Why was Yukari sitting next to her? Ia never even talked to her before, and in her experience people don't randomly eat lunch with total strangers. Ia looked around, surreptitiously - Piko, Oliver, Sonika, and all the rest were staring at her, looks of pure confusion painted on their faces. Unused to the attention, Ia sank back into her book. Maybe if she ignored it, the stares would go away.

"Hi Ia," said Yukari as she bit into her sandwich.

Ia slightly raised her eyes, warily looking at Yukari, sizing her up like she would an enemy. Unsure of Yukari's aim or objectives, Ia wasn't quite sure of what to do or say.

"...hello," Ia said, guardedly. "Why are you sitting with me?"

"I felt like it," said Yukari, smiling. "You looked pretty cool, which is why I decided to talk to you!"

Cool? Ia began to look at Yukari as if she was some kind of space alien. The word 'cool' had never been used with Ia. Ever. "...right..."

"So...what're you reading?"

"Um..._House of Leaves_," said Ia.

There was a slight pause.

"By Mark Danielewski," added Ia, feeling a very small burst of hope in her heart. Maybe, just maybe, Yukari read that book too.

"Oh. I've never heard of it," Yukari said, extinguishing Ia's hopes as easily as a bucket of water thrown on a candle. "Um...have you ever read _Dusk_?"

Ia frowned deeply at the mention of that vampire romance novel and disdainfully shook her head.

"...guess not, then," said Yukari, sounding a little disappointed. She began listing the names of various romance novels that Ia had never read and would never read.

"_Previous Off_?"

"No."

"_Headphones_?"

"No...look," Ia put her book down, "I don't read books like those."

Yukari gave Ia a very dour look. "You have no idea what you're missing." That said, she took Ia's book and flipped through it, her eyes quickly widening. "What the...what's happening in this book?" She flipped it around and pointed at a page of messed up boxes of text. "How do you even _read_ this?"

Ia felt the urge to smile at Yukari's obvious confusion, her face remaining perfectly impassive. "It's a strange book."

Yukari shook her head as she paged through it. "No kidding. I can't read this," she said with a laugh, handing Ia back her book. "So now that we're acquainted, wanna hang out after school?"

What? No one ever invited Ia to hang out after school with them. That was something that happened to Mayu, not Ia. For a moment, Ia thought she misheard. "What?"

"Let's hang out after school!" said Yukari, cheerfully.

Ia stared at the girl in disbelief, hardly believing her ears. "Wh...what? Are you serious? Me?" She pointed at herself. "Why not with your friends?"

"Well, I want to get to know you better," said Yukari. "So just say yes or no."

"Did your friends put you up to this?" Ia asked, unwilling to believe it. Nothing like this ever happened to before, and she felt shaky, strange. "Is this some sort of dare?"

"It's not a dare," said Yukari with a smile that communicated nothing but absolute friendliness and trustworthiness. "They're not putting me up to anything. So? How about it?" She held out her hand.

Ia eyed it. Never before had a hand seemed so threatening. She hesitantly raised her hand and extended it so that she was grasping Yukari's hand in a sort of handshake. Though she hated to be touched, Ia could manage this much at least. Ia realized that she was trembling a little. Was she really so excited about something so...minor to other people? Ia swallowed, hard, and Yukari tightened her grip around Ia's hand, reassuringly, as if to tell her that she's in capable company.

"So...right after school?" Ia asked. "Today?"

Yukari grinned and nodded. "Yup. Today."

-o-o-o-

When school ended, Ia made her way outside to the gates where Yukari told her where she would be waiting, but along the way she bumped into Mayu, who was hanging about rooting around in her backpack for something.

"Hey, watch where you're going," Mayu began, irritated, but upon seeing it was Ia her anger quickly died. "Oh, sorry! Didn't know it was you."

"It's fine. What're you looking for?" Ia asked, a little curious despite herself. Her sister rarely rooted around her backpack quite so vigorously. Mayu looked as though she was throttling the thing.

Mayu bit her lip. "Um, just my math homework. My friends gave me the sheet but now I can't find it. How about you? You look like you're in a hurry."

Ia paused. She wasn't sure if she wanted to tell Mayu about Yukari's invitation. After all, Ia was still a little afraid that Yukari didn't mean it, that it was all some big prank, and Ia didn't want to lose even more points of respect in her younger stepsister's eyes. "I have to work on some new mixes back home."

Mayu frowned, disappointment clearly evident in her eyes. "You're walking so fast to lock yourself in your room _again?_"

"Yeah, bye," Ia said, and before Mayu could protest, Ia practically ran over to the gates, her heart thudding loudly in her ears. She was beginning to feel that sinking fearfulness, one that hit her at full force when she reached the gates and saw that Yukari wasn't there, not even after Ia stopped and talked with Mayu. All at once, despair crashed down on Ia's mind. Her feelings about friendship were so new, so fragile...but Ia stayed there and waited, hoping against hope that it wasn't a big joke. She could already see it in her mind's eye, Piko and Yukari sniggering to themselves about Ia wasting her time waiting.

"Sorry for the wait, Ia," called Yukari, and all at once Ia's fears were replaced by a wave of relief. Turning, Ia saw Yukari running over, looking rather hurried.

"What took you so long?" Ia asked, trying to disguise her feelings with a scowl. "I'm not used to waiting for other people, you know."

"Ah, sorry, sorry," Yukari grinned apologetically, "Piko wanted me to see a new magic trick of his."

"I see..." Ia sighed. "Well, what now?"

That took Yukari up short. She paused and thought. "Oh, um...what do you usually do after school?"

"I study," said Ia. "Or...do music things." She didn't quite trust Yukari enough to elaborate, and hoped that Yukari wouldn't press.

Unfortunately, press she did. "Music things?" Yukari perked up. "I like music. What do you do? Do you play an instrument?"

"Um, something like that..." Ia said, beginning to regret this entire proposition. Yukari picked up on Ia's reticence and confusion passed over her expression. She looked as though she wanted to ask more, and Ia hoped she wouldn't.

"Well...okay," said Yukari, slowly, and then her expression returned to one of a cheerful smile. "So what do you want to do?"

"Um..."

There was an awkward silence for a few moments as Ia stared off into space and Yukari shifted her weight from one food to another, before the silence was abruptly broken.

"Well, when there's nothing else to do...we can always go shopping!" Yukari said, her voice suddenly energetic again. "Shopping, topped off with some food at the food court...I'm fixing to watch a new movie too, so it works out! How does that sound to you?" Yukari turned, looked at Ia. "Dinner, shopping, movie...is that okay with you?"

Ia didn't know what to say, taken off guard by Yukari's colloquial use of the word 'fixing' and by the prospect that she'd be spending dinner with this strange new girl too. To someone so unused to social interaction, this much seemed like a lot...yet, it was strangely appealing as well. Ia nodded, hesitantly.

"Great!" Yukari grabbed Ia by the wrist. "Let's go then! Off to the mall!"

That said, Yukari started running, practically dragging Ia behind her.


	2. Chapter 2

Ia stood inside the air-conditioned expanse of the mall and stared. All around her were white walls, florescent lights, large store windows proclaiming sales or displaying clothes. There was a strong smell of perfume from perfume stalls. A loud buzzing noise of people talking filled the mall. Ia trembled a little, intimidated. She had never gone inside a mall before, since she did her shopping online. There were so many stores to go to that Ia didn't even know where to start.

Next to her, Yukari was cheerfully humming as she looked through the mall's directory, looking comfortable and at home. "What kind of clothes do you like, Ia?"

"Uh..." Ia looked down at her clothes before realizing that she was still in her school uniform. "I like..." she shrugged, "normal clothes."

"Normal clothes?" Yukari furrowed her eyebrows and looked at Ia. "Like what?"

Ia couldn't quite describe it. Her own sense of fashion was somewhat undeveloped. "Um, like...shirts? I haven't been to a mall before."

"Whoah, what?" Yukari's eyes widened and she stared at Ia. "You've never gone to the mall?"

Ia mutely shook her head. Yukari's blatantly shocked tone made Ia a little self-conscious, and she looked away from Yukari's nakedly curious gaze, feeling a small heat in her cheeks.

"Well," said Yukari, a small, mischievous grin spreading on her face, "at least now we know what we're going to do."

Ia felt a small rooting feeling of nervous dread at Yukari's tone, one that was confirmed the moment Yukari grabbed her by the wrist again and dragged her into the nearest clothing store. All Ia could do was helplessly stand next to her, lost and confused, as Yukari examined and rejected countless items of clothing. Eventually, Yukari grabbed a rather large pile of clothing before carting Ia over to the changing rooms, practically pushing her into the room after throwing the clothing items in after her.

Ia stared at herself in the mirror for a few moments before turning towards the door. "Hey...what goes with what?"

"Use your best judgment," Yukari answered, cheerily. "Oh! And show me what you're wearing too, just come out the door when you finish changing into whatever."

Sighing, knowing that there's no escape, Ia started unbuttoning her uniform jacket and undoing her tie. Shucking off the rest of her clothes she selected a pink skirt, a black short-sleeved shirt, and a longer sleeved shirt to wear underneath. After staring at herself in the mirror for a few moments, acutely aware of the fact that her clothing choices would most likely be judged, Ia smoothed out her hair, though it was so long and mussed that there wasn't much point.

"Are you done yet?" Yukari called from outside, her voice sounding a little bored, and Ia nodded before realizing that Yukari couldn't see her. Taking a breath, she opened the changing room door and stepped outside, where Yukari was sitting on a brown chair. At the sight of Ia, Yukari's eyes lit up and she leaned forward, carefully examining Ia's clothes while Ia fidgeted nervously.

Yukari's face cracked into a smile. "Wow, Ia...you look great! This outfit looks so cute on you!"

At the praise, Ia felt her cheeks heat up unexpectedly in a blush. "Th-thanks..."

Yukari leapt to her feet. "Well, while you were in the changing room, I got some more clothes for you...so try these on too!" That said, she shoved more clothes into Ia's arms and pushed her back into the changing room.

Ia sighed. It looked like it was going to be a long day.

-o-o-o-

By the end of it all, Ia found to her surprise that she had wound up purchasing a sizable amount of clothing. She woke up from it all sitting on the hard plastic seat of a food court, eating burgers from McDonald's with Yukari, who paid for the burgers. Ia had never before eaten such food, but after a few bites of the burger she had to admit that there's a certain trashy appeal to fast food. Except...

"It's so...greasy," Ia said as she stared at her fingertips.

"Of course! It's food court food," said Yukari. "It's bad for you, but it's good for a quick fix when you're hungry." As if to emphasize this, she took a huge bite of her burger.

Ia stared at Yukari, not quite understanding the benefits of greasy food. "I...see." She continued eating the food, taking a few bites of her burger and then eating some of the fries, which were...were...Ia's eyes widened, her tongue overwhelmed by the taste. They were salty, but...delicious. Eagerly she ate more of them, until she had tucked away a significant portion of the food and could eat no more.

"So what kind of music do you like?" Yukari asked. "You mentioned that you liked music before."

Ia blinked and looked up at the ceiling of the mall. What kind of music _did _she like? She listened to so many it was hard to choose. No matter what kind of music it was, Ia could usually find something she liked about each genre. She consumed rap, pop, rock, folk, country, metal, electronic, and more. "I like a lot of kinds of music."

Yukari laughed. "That's specific. Okay, I'll tell you what I like then." She leaned forward, smiling. "Have you heard of Hatsune Miku?"

"Of course I have..." Hatsune Miku was such a big singer these days that not knowing her was impossible. Not only that, but Ia had made several mashups of her songs before. Not that she was going to tell Yukari that at the moment. "What about her?"

"I'm like, _addicted _to her new single," said Yukari. "It's called _Romeo and Cinderella_. Her first hit was _Melt_ but I didn't really get into her music until now."

Right..._Romeo and Cinderella_. Ia remembered seeing a ten-foot billboard advertising it before. It was a more mature song at odds with Miku's previously cute bubblegum image. "It's a good song," said Ia.

"I know right? It's great! She's really versatile...or maybe she's just growing up," Yukari laughed. "There's a rumor that her next single is going to be something with Megurine Luka, but since Miku usually does stuff with Kaito I don't know if it's true or not."

Ia shrugged. "_Romeo and Cinderella_ had a really pink color scheme in its advertising. It's possible."

There was a pause, Yukari's eyes growing wide. "Whoa...I didn't even think about that! True, usually they would've just gone with making her wear blue, right? But this time, she's wearing _pink," _Yukari snapped her fingers. "More fuel for the shipping fire."

"Shipping fire?" Ia had no idea what those words meant.

"Oh, uh," said Yukari, suddenly looking mildly flustered. "It's not important. Umm, hey, wanna watch a movie?"

"A movie? Which one?"

Yukari smiled excitedly. "Well," she began, "I've heard there's this new movie out called _Ai to Makoto_. Want to watch that?"

Ia swallowed the lump in her throat. Yukari looked so excited about it...even though Ia had only just met the girl, she was already forming an attachment to her. This was dangerous, Ia recognized. What if Yukari didn't want to hang out with her after today? What if, next week, Yukari ignored her like everyone else? It was safer to stay away, Ia told herself. Right. She didn't need anyone else. Don't get attached. Therefore, Ia should say no. Say that she was busy, that she had to do homework back home even though it was Friday.

"Um, okay," said Ia instead, "I'll watch it."

Yukari's smile grew even wider. "Then we better get popcorn and tickets."

-o-o-o-

Blinking at the darkness of the outside at night, Ia smiled as Yukari laughed next to her, the two of them walking to the train station. It had been a good movie, all considered, a normal romantic shoujo, but it was a sweet, fun watch.

"Tsumabuki Satoshi is such a good actor!" Yukari exclaimed. "I really liked him in _Waterboys_."

"_Waterboys_?"

"Wait," Yukari stopped and stared at Ia, "you haven't heard of _Waterboys_? It was so big! It came out in 2001. It's a really funny comedy about synchronized swimming."

Synchronized swimming? No wonder Ia had never heard about it. "Uh, right..."

"It's a great movie!" Yukari enthused. "But anyways, you should definitely watch more of Tsumabuki's movies. They're so good. I think you'll like _Spring Snow_. It's based off a book, so that sounds like that's right up your alley. Oh," Yukari perked up, "I have a copy of it that I can lend you."

"Ah, no," Ia said quickly, "you don't have to lend me a copy-"

"I want to!"

Ia glanced away, unsure of how to react to this. Yukari was so nice that to someone like Ia, who never really had any friends, her actions bordered on strange. What kind of girl was this generous? Maybe it really _was _all some kind of big set-up, and at the end of today Piko and the rest would step out from nowhere and reveal that it was a prank.

Yukari cocked her head, a confused expression passing over her face. "Are you okay, Ia?"

"Oh..." Ia snapped herself out of it. "I'm fine."

"You sure?" Yukari looked concerned. "You don't want to sit down or anything?"

Ia shook her head. "No, uh, that's...that's okay. I'm fine."

"If you say so," Yukari said with a slight frown. "Um, so...did you have fun today?"

Yukari looked so curious and serious that Ia had to give her a straight answer.

"I had fun," she said, trying to smile. Her muscles weren't used to it. Ia immediately felt foolish for even making the attempt, and quickly dropped it.

Yukari, on the other hand, seemed to be completely fascinated by Ia's poor attempt at a smile. "That...that was the first time I've ever seen you smile, Ia!" She grinned, a natural, carefree one that made Ia's heart skip a beat for some reason. "Did you really have fun with me? That's great! I was worried that I might be annoying you, you know."

"You're not annoying," said Ia, hesitantly, also unused to saying such open words. "I had fun today."

Yukari clapped her hands together. "Great!"

There was a pause as the two walked on. Ia felt like she had to say something.

"Um," she said. "Did you have fun too?" Inwardly, she cursed herself. She sounded so juvenile, so immature.

"Yeah," Yukari nodded. "I had a lot of fun...oh, we're here already." Indeed they were - the train station loomed before them.

"I see..." said Ia, feeling a brief, faint stab of disappointment. "I guess I'll see you next week, then, after the weekend."

"Yup," said Yukari with a grin, before she did something that astonished Ia: namely, she bounded forward and wrapped her arms around her in a hug.

At once, Ia froze up. She had absolutely no idea what to do, where to put her hands, and so she simply stood there, at loss, eyes wide. Yukari was soft and warm, her hair smelling faintly of flowers and shampoo, and Ia's breath stuck in her throat.

Then, Yukari pulled back with a cheery grin and clasped Ia's hands between her own. Ia had to fight the instinctive urge to recoil - she hadn't been touched so much in such a short span of time in a while. "I'll lend you the DVD on Monday," Yukari promised, before letting go and walking over towards the station, hand raised in farewell. "Bye, Ia!"

"Bye," said Ia quietly, raising her hand in turn. She watched Yukari's back for a few moments before sighing, turning around, and heading back to her own home. Her head was a mess, and Ia waited for her heartbeat to calm itself on the way back.

-o-o-o-

"You're home late," Mayu remarked as Ia pushed open the door and kicked off her shoes. Mayu was sitting at the TV, a bowl of popcorn on her lap as she watched some drama. "What's up? Oh," Mayu turned around, eyes bright with interest, "were you on a _date?"_

"Ha ha," said Ia, dryly. "No, I wasn't out on a date." She walked over past Mayu to the kitchen to pour herself a glass of water.

"Well," Mayu said, "judging from those bags you're carrying, apparently you really expanded your wardrobe. And I mean," she grinned at Ia, "why would you upgrade your wardrobe unless you're trying to impress a cute guy?"

"I didn't get _that_ many clothes," Ia said, taking out a glass and filling it with water. "And I didn't get it because of a guy." Ia hesitated. She still wasn't sure if she wanted to tell Mayu about Yukari yet. She had no idea how her sister would react, and she had no idea if Yukari's friendship with her would carry on to Monday. It was better not to get her hopes up. Most likely Yukari would forget all about Ia over the weekend. Though the thought of it was a stab in Ia's chest, it was something she was already expecting. After all, Yukari had other friends. There was no reason for her to want to keep hanging out with Ia."I just thought maybe I should...switch it up a little or something."

"Whoa," Mayu's eyes went wide. "What happened to you? You're going outside? You're trying new things?"

"Don't get _that_ excited," Ia said.

"I can't help it! Every day when I come home you're in your room," said Mayu. "This is all brand new."

Ia sighed. "Okay. What'd you do tonight?"

Mayu shrugged. "Not much. I just watched some movies. Hey, Ia," Mayu leaned over the couch, "now that you're out and about, let's go to the tea shop sometime!"

"No thanks," Ia turned around to hoist her bags to her room.

"Ahhh, you're so cold, Ia! So cold," Mayu whined behind her.

-o-o-o-

The weekend passed, slow and boring. To Ia's surprise, she actually found herself both anticipating and dreading Monday, so that she could see Yukari again, but Ia still had that lingering insecurity inside her. Somehow Ia had gotten quite attached to the new transfer student, and on the day school started Ia almost flew out of bed, haphazardly put on her uniform, ate a quick breakfast, and with a hurried 'bye' at Mayu, who had just sat down to breakfast, Ia ran out of her house. It was only when she reached the gates when she realized that she had arrived at school too early - the campus was almost completely empty.

Oh well. At least she'd be able to read her book...

Some time later, students slowly filed into the classroom, all of them completely ignoring Ia. Yukari ran in and took her seat, greeting all of her friends, who were already beginning to surround her, and then got back up, as if she had just remembered something, and walked over to Ia.

"Good morning," said Yukari, her smile bright and radiant.

"G-good morning," Ia stammered. Yukari seemed to remember something, for she grabbed her backpack, rooted through it, and gave a slightly worn DVD to Ia - _Spring Snow_.

"Oh..." Ia said, her eyes wide. For some reason, she was surprised Yukari even remembered.

"Here's _Spring Snow_, the movie I was telling you about," Yukari said. "It's really good, so when you're done with it, tell me what you think."

"I will," Ia said. "Thank you."

Yukari grinned at her. "It's no problem, Ia."

It seemed as though Yukari's greeting also brought her friends over - Piko, Oliver, Sonika, Gumi, all of whom never paid attention to Ia before. Ia stared goggle-eyed at all of them, her hands clutching the DVD, heart beating fearfully, as they all greeted her as if they did so every morning.

Ia didn't know what to think. This was all so new, this amount of attention. She glanced up at the clock - fifteen minutes before class started.

"So..." said Sonika, slowly. Ia turned towards her, stunned. Sonika had never spoke to her before. Ever. "Want to...play chess sometime?"

-o-o-o-

That was how it all began, at least. Urged on by an ever-supportive Yukari, who kept bringing her friends over to Ia's desk every morning and lunch break, Ia slowly became acclimatized to spending her time with people, though not completely; she had become so used to being lonely that spending time with people was still something that made her nervous, and sometimes she would search the eyes of Yukari's friends and wonder if she was being set up to be the butt of someone's joke.

Ia still spent the majority of her time with Yukari, and this was where the trouble started. It was, after all, no big secret that Ia wasn't very good about being touched, but Yukari was something else. That enthusiastic hug in front of the train station was only the beginning - Yukari was all about friendly hugs and playful jabs. In short, Yukari seemed to have no conception of boundaries.

She was like that with _everyone - _Ia wasn't deluded enough to think that Yukari would only hug her (and there was no reason why Ia would think that, anyways, because that thought was perfectly ridiculous) - and it was, in Ia's mind, just plain _unfair_. Ia had spent most of her life being lonely, constructing her defenses, and Yukari just waltzed into her life as though Ia's boundaries weren't even there. Don't get too attached, Ia would tell herself, but it was so hard when Yukari was so friendly and her friends so welcoming. Oftentimes Ia found herself caught between letting go, giving in, or clinging to the hard walls she constructed around herself. It was a constant war, one that Ia never had to deal with until now.

It really shouldn't be this hard, and for Yukari, it wasn't. She was so relaxed and free. Obviously, she never worried like Ia did about how people would react if she hugged them, or if she touched them. And for Ia, it really hadn't been a problem until Yukari swept into her life.

"You're spending a lot more time outside these days," Mayu had commented one night when Ia returned home laden with a bag full of brownies that Oliver had baked. "Are those brownies?"

"Yes."

"Oh!" Mayu's eyes lit up. "Are those from a _secret admirer_?"

Ia shook her head. "Hardly. Oliver just baked way too many...he's a stress baker, apparently."

"Oliver bakes?" Mayu gaped at her. "I didn't know that!"

"It's supposed to be a secret," Ia said. "Want one?"

Life went on like that for the next few weeks. It was only when Ia mentioned off-handedly to Yukari that Mayu would be out at her friends' place for a sleepover when her troubles came to a head. The moment Ia told her that, Yukari invited herself over. Ia had tried to protest, but Yukari had given her puppy dog eyes and, well, there was no way anyone could resist those.

The next thing Ia knew, they were sitting on the couch, Yukari flipping through the DVDs she brought over. Upon learning that Ia hadn't really watched many movies before, Yukari seemed to have taken it upon herself to properly educate her.

"Okay, so," said Yukari, "I have like, a bunch of movies from a bunch of different genres. All of these are _great_." She tapped the cover of one of them. "This is _3-Iron. _Back in Artech, I had a friend named SeeU and she introduced me to all sorts of movies like this. Though if that's too heavy for you right now," Yukari took out another DVD, "I have _Breakfast at Tiffany's_ and _Toy Story_ and _The Truman Show_ and-"

"Wait," said Ia, holding up a hand. "Just choose anything. I don't know what to pick."

Yukari sighed. "But it's so hard to _choose_..."

Eventually, the two of them, through a series of coin flips, managed to narrow it down to a single movie. After putting it into the player, after preparing the popcorn, after flicking off the lights, Ia found herself trapped in her own personal hell.

Yukari had apparently decided that Ia would be her cuddle buddy during the movie or something, because the purple haired girl had an arm around Ia's shoulders, her weight palpable, one hand alternating between playing with Ia's fingers and grabbing popcorn, the other idly sifting through Ia's hair. Ia, for her part, was wedged against the edge of the sofa, trying to put as much distance between her and Yukari as possible, but that wasn't really working because Yukari was taller and the weight of her arm was pressing on Ia's shoulders in such a way that Ia was practically falling onto Yukari's body. It didn't help that Yukari _smelled_ good too, like lavender, and Ia was rapidly discovering that she just couldn't deal with the situation.

She tried to fight it, of course, and concentrate on the movie. She was socially savvy enough to know that some girls were just really physically affectionate with their friends, and Yukari just happened to be one of those girls. She hugged and cuddled her friends at school enough already, back before she even started talking to Ia, so Ia was certain that this sort of behavior was just par for the course for someone like Yukari. The problem was, though, that oft-reiterated phrase - Ia hated being touched, and Yukari's closeness was causing all sorts of short-circuits in Ia's brain.

As Ia tried to deal with her anxiety, Yukari stiffened in excitement and pointed at the screen. "Oh! This is _such _a good scene. Look at that cinematography."

Ia 'oofed' at the sudden shift in balance and dragged her attention back to the television. There was the main character in a boat. "Huh? He's just in a boat."

"Ia! Haven't you been paying attention?" Yukari scolded. "Truman's rebelling! He's trying to get back out to the real world. Look," she pointed at the screen. "This is the part where the _artificiality _of his world is shoved in your face."

Ia swallowed. She didn't exactly want to tell Yukari that she had spent most of the movie anxiously trying not to pay attention to how close Yukari was. "Oh...yeah, that's great."

Thankfully, Yukari didn't seem to notice. "Isn't it? I watched this movie for the first time when I was a kid, and, well," she laughed, "that scene's still stuck in my mind now." She let out a small sigh against Ia's skin, making goosebumps appear, and Ia shivered and tried to tear her attention back to the movie.

Thankfully, Ia managed to watch the rest of the movie without incident, and as the credit rolled, Yukari turned towards Ia, her face a bit too close for Ia's comfort.

"So what do you want to watch next?" she asked, her breath tickling Ia's ear.

Ia swallowed, hard. "I don't care," she said.

"Right..." Yukari laughed. "Want to coin flip this again?"

Yukari was way too close, and Ia defaulted to her normal response in uncomfortable social situations. "Whatever," she mumbled.

"Well," said Yukari, "we don't have to watch anything if you don't want." She rested her head on Ia's shoulder. "What do _you_ want to do?"

Ia mumbled something incoherent to even herself, mainly because she was suddenly acutely aware of the situation she was in now - sitting with some overly affectionate girl in a dark room with a blanket over them on her couch after watching a movie - and the fact that Yukari sounded so...so...seductive, even though Ia was certain she wasn't.

_Shit._ Ia's mind just _had_ to go there, didn't it? Ia tried to ignore the heat in her cheeks and push the thought away, but once it was thought, it was over. It was all Ia could think about. Her heart was beating like a panicked rabbit's and Ia prayed that Yukari wouldn't do anything to set her off.

But of course, Yukari had to do just that. On the surface, it was all rather innocent. Yukari merely squeezed herself closer to Ia, pressing her chest against Ia's arm, but even that was enough to push Ia over the edge. She practically flung herself out of the couch, leaving Yukari staring at her, eyes wide with confusion. Of course Yukari wouldn't get what just happened. Of course.

"Ia," Yukari said, eyes wide, "what's wrong?"

Ia put a hand to her forehead, tried to calm down her rapidly beating heart. "I don't...feel well."

"Huh? Really?" At once Yukari's voice transitioned to concern, and she reached out her arms. "What happened?"

Ia shook her head. "Nothing."

"No, Ia, tell me. You were fine before..."

Ia felt a burst of irritation in her mind. Why was Yukari being so difficult about this? "Well, now I'm not, okay?"

Ia had snapped the words, and Yukari flinched. At the stricken look on Yukari's face, Ia felt a stab of guilt, but that wasn't enough to stop her resolve. This...touching thing had to stop. "It's just..." Ia dropped her hands, "you're invading my personal space. All these hugs and cuddles and tickles, I can't do it, okay? I..." Ia looked away, "I don't like...being touched."

Ia looked back at Yukari, whose eyes were like saucers. "Oh...oh," she said, drawing back. "I'm...I'm sorry, Ia, I didn't know..."

"Well, now you do."

"I'm so sorry," Yukari repeated, looking more and more upset by the moment, her voice trembling in a way that clawed at Ia's heart. She looked so much like a hurt, kicked puppy that Ia couldn't stand it - she had to look away. "I'm so, _so _sorry."

Ia took a breath. Her anxiety earlier was ebbing away now, leaving only the guilt. She felt numb all over, and she couldn't quite bring herself to look at Yukari again. "Right...that's good."

There was a silence in the room. Ia kept her eyes trained on the wall as she heard the sounds of Yukari getting up from the couch and putting her DVDs back into her bag.

"I guess I should, um, go now," Yukari mumbled, sounding as though she was about to cry.

_No, wait, _was what Ia should say, but she couldn't bring herself to. The guilt was eating her alive. It wasn't Yukari's fault Ia was like this, but what was Ia supposed to do? Sit there with Yukari constantly _touching_ her? Ia couldn't deal with that. Not yet. She couldn't deal with the fact that her body reacted like a teenage boy's earlier either. Ia didn't know if it was because barely anyone touched her before that she reacted that way, or if it was something else that she didn't want to think too much about, but either way, Ia had to be strong.

"Yeah," said Ia, keeping her eyes away. "I guess you should."

For the first time since they became friends, Yukari didn't hug Ia goodbye.

Instead, Ia got the sound of her door closing shut behind her.

Ia stood there for a long while, her eyes closed, before she fell back on the couch. Yukari's scent surrounded her, and Ia felt so bad she wanted to throw up.

Perfect. Just perfect. She got what she wanted and she felt like shit.

* * *

**After looking through the development of the story, I think I'm gonna have to up this up to an M rating...sorry guys D: I dunno if actual lemon will occur but...just in case? xDDD**


	3. Chapter 3

"Huh?" Mayu said over her cup of royal milk tea. "I don't get it. What's the problem?"

The two of them, Ia and Mayu, were sitting in a tea shop after Mayu had sensed that Ia was feeling even more down than usual, and had taken advantage of Ia's state to drag her over to the tea shop. It was a rather Rococo-looking establishment, all ruffled and poofy and pink, and Ia was feeling horribly out of place. Every single one of the shop's customers were dressed in lolita fashion like Mayu, and Ia, dressed in her punky-looking clothes, stood out. She could almost feel the eyes of everyone on her, her self-consciousness overwhelming.

But there were bigger issues than that at the moment. Namely, Yukari. Ia looked down at her untouched cup of royal milk tea and sighed. "It just feels _weird_ when Yukari touches me...it's hard to explain."

"Weird?" Mayu asked. "Weird how?"

"I don't know," Ia mumbled. "Just weird. She always gets too close and she's all up in my personal space..." Ia rubbed her arm with her hand. "I can't deal with that. Like I said, there's no other word for it...it's just weird."

Mayu took a delicate sip of tea and ate a pink macaron from the plate on the table. "Well, maybe if you consulted a thesaurus, you would have more words."

"Haha," said Ia, dryly. "You're the best little sister ever."

"Aren't I? Here, try a macaron," Mayu gestured at the plate before sitting back in her seat. "Anyways! Do you get like this when anyone else hugs you?"

"That's the _point,_ no one else hugs me." Ia winced as the words came out - it sounded so incredibly pathetic. "I mean...you know I didn't really have any friends before Yukari, so...um..." Ia trailed off. "No basis for comparison."

Mayu frowned. "I _guess,_ but you should apologize to Yukari properly. She seems nice, so what's the problem with putting up with a few hugs? I've never seen you get this worked up about anyone before."

Ia sighed. "You don't get it. It's more complicated than that. I just don't like being touched. That's all."

Looking entirely unconvinced, Mayu reached out a hand and touched Ia on her arm. "How's this for you?"

Ia looked at it. "You know, now that I know you're trying to prove a point, I don't think I'm going to react in any way."

Mayu drew her hand back and groaned. "Fine. But still!" She pointed at Ia. "You should apologize. I don't get how it's a big deal."

_Of course you wouldn't, _Ia thought. No one did. Everyone else was normal, it was only Ia who had this weird problem with being touched. Ia looked down at her hands.

"Maybe," she said, and that was all.

-o-o-o-

The rest of the weekend passed in silence. Ia checked her cellphone a lot, but she never got any texts from Yukari, and as Monday approached, Ia found herself dreading it. After what happened at Ia's place the last time they saw each other, Ia had no idea what Yukari would be like. Not only that, but Ia wasn't especially eager to see Yukari again either.

Because, if, theoretically, Ia _did_ have those sorts of feelings towards Yukari, well, there was no guarantee that Yukari felt the same way. In fact, it was probably more likely that Yukari felt the complete opposite. Hell, the first time they hung out together, Yukari was gushing about some handsome actor. And if Yukari knew that her innocent touches were being taken _that way_ by Ia, then, well...

Ia didn't want to think about it. It would mean another load of guilt added on her shoulders, which was really something she didn't need right now. She pushed the thoughts out of her mind and survived the weekend until Monday morning.

That day, Ia walked to class alone and sat at her desk. She came early, so there was no one else in yet. She read a book as the classroom filled up, though Ia couldn't concentrate - her eyes kept flicking over towards the door to see if Yukari had come in yet.

"Morning, Yukari!" said Oliver with a wave, dropping his bag at his desk next to Ia's. "How was your weekend?"

Apparently Yukari hadn't told her friends about what happened if Oliver was being so friendly. Ia shrugged. "It was boring. I just did homework."

Oliver pulled a frown. "Ouch. That's awful. I was at choir practice most of the weekend. We have a big performance coming up soon, so," Oliver sighed, "I ended up baking a bunch of muffins. Want one?" he took out a bag full of muffins from his backpack.

"Sure." Ia took one.

"Hey Oliver, hey Ia!" shouted Gumi as she practically dragged Sonika in behind her. "How're you two today? Hey, is that a muffin? I'll have one, thanks!" Before Oliver could reply, Gumi plucked a muffin from the bag and ate it before looking around. "Hmmm, not many people up this morning, huh?"

"Yeah...it's because the weather is so cloudy," said Oliver.

Gumi shrugged. "I don't mind it. People are just too sensitive."

As time passed, the classroom filled up. Yukari came in near the end, looking rather tired, though she smiled once she saw her friends. Her eyes glided over Ia's as though Ia wasn't there.

"Hey everyone," she said as she came over. "What's up?"

"Geez," Piko leaned in, "you look really tired, Yukari. Have you been like, not sleeping? Bad dreams again?"

Yukari laughed. "No, no, I was just up late finishing the homework."

The teacher came in and the class hushed. Ia found herself struggling to pay attention, most of it diverted to Yukari. Yukari was acting perfectly normal, so maybe she was okay? Then again...Ia frowned. Yukari also paid absolutely no attention to Ia. The weight of her inattention was palpable, and also, just as awkward as Ia feared. Even Yukari's friends picked up on something off during lunch break, because Yukari did not interact with Ia at all.

"Uh," said Oliver, glancing between Yukari and Ia, "did...something happen between you two?"

"Oliver! Don't be so blunt," Sonika admonished, but Yukari laughed.

"No, no," she said. "Everything is fine." She made as if to put her arm around Ia's shoulders, though abruptly, she stopped the movement and put her arm away. The hesitation evident in each of Yukari's actions was both painfully obvious and just plain painful to Ia. The guilt stirred in her gut again and she looked down.

Oliver, as expected, looked completely unconvinced. "Well, if there's anything wrong-"

"Oliver," Ia interrupted, "stop. It's fine." She glanced over at Yukari from the corner of her eyes. Yukari was looking at her, though at eye contact Yukari looked away.

"Y-yeah," Yukari said, voice subdued. "Things are okay."

-o-o-o-

After school, on the way back home, Ia's cellphone started to ring. She checked it. Unknown number. Shrugging, Ia answered it.

"Hello?" she said.

"Hello," said an unfamiliar female voice, "would this happen to be, by any chance, Akasaka Ia's number?"

"Yes, that's right," said Ia. Before she could ask if the girl was selling something, the girl started to speak, her tone abruptly shifting from polite to angry.

"What did you do to Yukari?" the girl demanded.

"What?" Ia stopped walking. Who was this person? How did she know? "Wait, who...who even _are_ you?"

"I'm SeeU. You know, Yukari's best friend before she moved?"

Oh, right. Ia vaguely remembered Yukari bringing up SeeU the night when..._that_ happened. "How did you get my number?"

"I have my sources. Stop stalling. What did you do to Yukari?"

Did _Yukari_ give SeeU Ia's number? Why would she do that? Because she wanted her friend to yell at Ia? Ia felt a burst of hot irritation in her mind. What gave Yukari the right to give Ia's phone number out to random people? "I don't know what you mean."

"You know exactly what I mean. Yukari's been acting weird and I'm one hundred percent certain it's completely your fault."

Ia clenched her hand into a fist and kept walking. "Yukari's _always_ weird, doesn't mean it's my fault."

"Don't make the situation worse by insulting my best friend," SeeU warned. "Listen up, three days ago was when she started acting odd. You know, back when you had your movie night? She was crying on the phone and you know what? She wouldn't even tell me _why._ Until I got the truth out from her on Sunday, and apparently it turns out that some grumpy antisocial loner yelled at her for being who she was."

"Okay, correction," Ia held up a finger even though SeeU wasn't there, "I didn't _yell_ at her. I have a problem with being touched and Yukari just _wouldn't stop,_ okay? How is it my fault? She's the one with the boundary problem. If Yukari was a boy, we wouldn't even be talking about this."

There was a slight pause.

"Yeah, probably not," SeeU admitted, "but Yukari isn't a boy. So it's not like she's trying to get into your pants or anything. Her intentions are different."

Ia sighed. Funny how SeeU's words only made Ia feel worse. After all, her intentions may be different, but Ia wasn't even sure what her _own_ intentions were. Though she hated to admit it, her discomfort that night wasn't purely because of not liking to be touched.

But there was no way in hell that Ia was going to tell SeeU _that._ "Yeah. Okay.

"I want you to apologize to her," said SeeU. "Now she's second-guessing all the time about things she used to do naturally, because _you_ made her feel creepy and weird. She's just being affectionate. You should've been honest to her about that from the beginning instead of letting it all build up. All she wanted was to be friends with you, but," SeeU scoffed, "I can't imagine why. And right now, I bet she can't either."

That said, SeeU hung up, leaving nothing but the dial tone behind. Ia gritted her teeth. That last comment was completely unnecessary, said only to hurt Ia, and it did its job. Groaning, Ia ran a hand through her hair and texted Mayu.

_Did I mess up with Yukari?_

Mayu instantly responded.

_sort of! you should apologize. this is getting to you a lot ia, do you really like her? if you do we can talk about it! so do you~? _

At that, Ia texted back a firm no and shoved her phone back into her pocket.

-o-o-o-

The next day, before class, Yukari was in the classroom before Ia.

"I want to talk to you," said Yukari, catching hold of Ia's arm.

Ia stared at Yukari's hand on her arm until Yukari realized her mistake and quickly let go, mumbling an apology. Ia sighed, feeling a flicker of anger. She didn't forget SeeU's call yesterday.

"Well, you set your bulldog on me, so we have nothing to talk about," Ia said.

Yukari blinked. "Bulldog? What?"

"Don't play dumb. SeeU called me up yesterday and yelled at me. I don't even know how she would've gotten my number, other than you."

Yukari's eyes widened. "Wait...what? No, I didn't give her your number!"

"Well, how else would she yell at me?" Ia snapped.

Yukari swallowed. "Well, I mean...I _did_ tell her what happened, but...I never asked for her to do anything." Yukari looked down. "I would never ask someone else to confront someone like that. And I promise, I didn't give her your phone number."

Ia opened her mouth to say something, but Yukari beat her to it.

"And, Ia, I'm so, _so_ sorry that I ever made you so uncomfortable. And I'm not mad at you, no matter what SeeU said, and I really, really hope you're not mad at me either, but if you are then I totally understand and maybe we can work this out? I really do want to be friends with you, Ia, I...I want us to go back to the way we were before. You mean so much to me even though we haven't known each other that long and I don't want to ruin what we have because I was being a total dumbass, so...so..." Yukari trailed off. "If you don't want to be friends with me anymore, you can just say it and I promise I'll leave you alone forever, but I'm sorry...I just want us to...to maybe start over, maybe."

Ia drew in a breath to reply, but then Yukari froze, her eyes growing wide and anxious. "Oh," Yukari blurted out, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to say that much! I'll...um," Yukari ran over to her desk and started to pick up her bag, "I'll get going now, it was great talking to you Ia-"

"Hold it!" Ia shouted, and Yukari froze like a startled rabbit. "Where are you running off to? Class hasn't started yet.

"O-oh," Yukari blushed and put her bag back down. "Um, I'm sorry."

"No," said Ia. "I'm the one who should be sorry."

Yukari's eyes widened. She obviously had not been expecting an apology. "What?"

"Your friend...SeeU was right. I should have told you from the start that I had a problem with that kind of stuff. And I shouldn't have made my problems into your problems."

Yukari shook her head. "No, I should've been more considerate. And I'm sorry SeeU went off on you like that...I'll go talk to her. She's really protective. Usually she's pretty cheerful but when she gets mad, she's scary. "

Ia looked down. "Right...and things were so awkward yesterday, I didn't really know what to do. You didn't greet me, and after school you didn't say good-bye. You would've ignored me all day if Oliver didn't say anything."

Yukari looked guilty. "I didn't think you wanted to talk with me, after that. I wanted to give you some space."

Ia shook her head. "No. When I told you that, I didn't want it to become this big...thing you have to tiptoe around. Since then you've just been so weird about it, and I don't want that."

Yukari considered this. "...okay. I'm sorry," she said finally, looking at Ia. "Are we, um...good now?" She put on a smile.

Ia smiled back. "We're good."

"Really? Yay! That's great!" Yukari bounded over to Ia and made as if to hug her before she abruptly froze and drew back, hand over mouth. "Oh! I'm sorry, um, is it...is it okay if I hug you?" She practically blurted out the last sentence. "You can say no if you want!"

Ia shook her head. "It's fine. But no funny business." She added the last in a lighter-hearted tone of voice.

Yukari laughed. "Alright, I'll try." That said, she hugged Ia. Her arms were a little looser than before, and she seemed a little more on edge. Ia savored the hug anyways - she hadn't realized how much she missed Yukari's hugs until now.

"Morning guys!" said Oliver as he walked in, before he froze. "Oh, sorry! Am I, uh..." He made motions to leave.

Yukari let go of Ia. "No, no, it's fine! Ia and I just made up, that's all."

"Ah," said Oliver. "So there _was_ something wrong."

"Yeah...but it's okay now!" Yukari turned towards Ia. "Right, Ia?"

Ia hesitated only for the slightest of moments before nodding and smiling. "Right."

-o-o-o-

It took another week for Ia to work up the courage to ask Yukari to hang out again. After 'The Incident', Yukari had been true to her word, not asking Ia to hang out unless Ia asked her first. While Ia liked that Yukari respected her boundaries, at the same time, there was something she missed about the spontaneity of it all, how sometimes out of the blue she would receive a text from Yukari inviting her to eat ice cream or something of that sort.

Besides, Ia wasn't really good with the initiating meet-ups thing, mainly because she had never done anything like that before. Even though it had been Yukari's idea - "I'll back off, so you let me know when you want to hang out!" - actually texting her a date was difficult. Ia spent many a night staring at her phone, frustrated with herself at not being able to text her a simple _time_ to hang out at.

Ia managed to put it off until a hot Saturday afternoon when she sat down on her couch, glared at her phone, and decisively typed out a text.

_Hey, want to grab coffee tomorrow when you're free?_

Ia scrutinized it. It kind of...sounded like she was asking Yukari out on a date. Quickly Ia deleted it and tried again.

_Sorry about how late I am but_

No, that sounded a bit too apologetic.

"Whatever you're trying to text, just text it," Mayu's voice floated over from the kitchen.

"Mind your own business," Ia said back.

Mayu appeared from the kitchen, holding a knife. Ia instinctively stiffened. Even though it was a perfectly ordinary kitchen knife, Ia didn't entirely trust her stepsister around sharp implements. Scowling, Mayu pointed the knife at Ia. It was bloodstained with whatever she was chopping up for dinner, something that did not help Ia's screaming fight or flight instincts. "Is this about Yukari? Just text her! You've been sighing and flopping around on the couch for the past five minutes, you know."

Ia sighed, flopped back on the couch once more for good measure, and in the end sent a single, one-word text.

_Tea?_

Yukari's reply was instant.

_I thought you'd never ask!_

* * *

**Hey! Updating will be slower after today because of those dreaded beasts called 'finals', 'projects', and 'final projects' DX Still, I'll try not to keep you guys waiting too long! **


	4. Chapter 4

"I've never been here," Yukari said, eyes wide as she looked around the tea shop. "How'd you know about this place?"

Ia shrugged. "Mayu goes here a lot."

"Oh, I see," Yukari said. "I'd like to meet her sometime! She sounds nice. Anyways, I'm so glad you decided to meet up with me! I was worried that you weren't going to."

"No...I just had some texting problems."

Yukari frowned. "Oh. Is it like, a hardware issue?"

"Um," Ia wasn't sure how to put this without sounding like a total social retard, "no, I just...get weird about organizing things, I'm really bad at texting people. It's, uh, easy for me to forget."

"Oh," Yukari nodded and gave Ia a reassuring smile. "Okay! Then, if that's fine with you, I'll do the organizing? I thought that it'd be better this time if you did it, considering, you know, what happened."

"Yeah..." Ia didn't want to get into a heavy talk about what just happened, so instead she stared intently at her milk tea and hoped that Yukari would change the subject.

"Is something wrong?" There was a concerned tone in Yukari's voice now. Crap, Ia thought. That backfired.

"N-nothing's wrong," Ia said quickly. "I'm just tired, that's all. Uhh," she searched her mind for conversational gambits, "h-how's school?"

Yukari laughed. "As good as it can be. I'm not that good at school, to be honest. Moved around a bit too much..." For a moment, a strangely solemn expression passed over her face before she quickly replaced it with a cheerful smile. "But whatever, right? That's not important. I'm _way_ more interested in what's going on with you!" Yukari leaned forward. "We haven't talked in _forever!_ What books have you been reading? For the past few days you've been buried in them."

Ia paused. A part of her wanted to pursue the cause of that strange expression of melancholy that passed over Yukari's face seconds earlier, but the event had already passed, and it would be awkward to bring it up now - especially for the not very socially well-versed Ia. "I've been reading this book about a lighthouse keeper...it's supposed to be sad, but I don't think it's that sad."

"A lighthouse keeper?" Yukari probed. "Why isn't it sad?"

"Well...it's supposed to be sad because he's so lonely," Ia took a sip of her milk tea. "It's just him, the ocean, the lighthouse, and the island, all the way out in the middle of nowhere. There's no one else for miles around, and he's an exile. But I don't think it's that sad."

"Really?" Yukari looked rather horrified. "But that's so depressing! Think about it, you're all by yourself in the middle of nowhere. You don't have any friends to hang out with."

Ia shrugged. "Being alone can be nice. You don't have to deal with people that much. Are you going to drink your tea?"

Yukari, jolted, gave a small start and stared down at her cup of tea as though it had materialized from nowhere. "O-oh...yeah. Yeah." She quickly raised it up to her lips and took a small sip. "What's wrong with dealing with people?"

Ia shifted in her seat, trying to think of a way to properly organize her thoughts. "People are...it's safer being alone."

"That's _so_ not true," Yukari protested. "People are born to be social."

The words buried themselves in Ia's mind. People were born to be social, sure. But Ia wasn't social at all. And it wasn't as though she was the only one like this either. Ia took a gulp of her tea, hoping to swallow some of her irritation with it. "Maybe you were, but not everyone's like that. _I'm_ not like that."

Yukari shook her head. "That's not true. If you were really set on being alone, then we wouldn't be sitting here now, right?"

"This is different! This is...this is..." Ia bit her lip and tried to think of a coherent argument. "You're just different from other people."

Yukari laughed and shook her head. "I'm not that special."

"Yes you are!" Ia said, a bit too hotly before she realized her disproportionate response and shrank back, cheeks slightly heated. "Um, I mean...you're different from the people here. No one really tried to talk to me before."

Yukari frowned. "I have no idea why they wouldn't. You're awesome. Anyways, I've decided. I'm going to drag you out into the world."

"What?" Ia stared at Yukari.

"You should go out more often," continued Yukari. "When I first met you, I couldn't believe you've never even been to the mall! There's a lot of stuff out there that I bet you haven't even _seen,_ so I've decided that I'm going to take you around. It'll be a blast! Oh," Yukari stopped herself and glanced over at Ia, "that is...if you're okay with it?"

Going outside more often? Ia wasn't especially opposed to it - it wasn't like she was agoraphobic or anything like that - but there was a nagging feeling in her that prevented her from saying 'yes' wholeheartedly. Besides, going outside meant people, and a lot of people meant crowds, which was something Ia was never very good at dealing with. "Um..."

"Please?" Yukari put her hands together. "I promise it'll be fun. I swear, I won't make you do anything you're uncomfortable with. It's not like we'll be going bungee jumping...unless you want to? Because I'm actually down for that if you are. I've never gone bungee jumping before!" Yukari looked more excited with each word she spoke. "Wow, that'd be so cool-"

"Hold it," Ia said, "I'm not going to go bungee jumping."

"Aw...well, it was worth a shot," Yukari laughed. "So are you okay with it?"

Ia took a breath, held it, and exhaled, a long sigh. "Sure. If you really want to."

"Really? Yay!" Yukari reached out and grabbed Ia's hand in excitement. She's warm, her skin soft against Ia's. "That's great! I'm so excited!"

When Ia didn't answer, Yukari seemed to realize that Ia was not looking at her face, but rather, at their joined hands on the table, and quickly Yukari pulled away. "O-oh, I'm sorry. I didn't even realize I was doing it..."

"Um," said Ia, still staring at her hand, which now felt very cold, "no...i-it's fine."

"Really?" Yukari slowly reached out and took hold of Ia's hand again, her thumb rubbing lightly on her skin. "This is fine?"

Ia looked up to see worried purple eyes. Even though her hand was warm again from Yukari's, her arms felt like they had goosebumps. "Yeah, this is okay...um," Ia hesitated, "it might not always be, though."

Yukari grinned. "That's fine. I'll just remember to ask."

-o-o-o-

The moment Ia got back home, her cellphone buzzed with a new text.

_Wanna go to the fair tomorrow? :D_

Fair? What fair? Ia stared at her phone, perplexed, racking her mind. It was at that moment when Mayu poked her head out from the kitchen.

"How was your thing-thing with Yukari?" she asked.

"Um, good," said Ia. "Hey, is there some kind of thing happening tomorrow?"

Mayu looked up at the ceiling. "Something...happening tomorrow? Well, there's a small arts fair going on. Why?"

Ia blinked. Right. Yamaha had a lot of those small art fairs, considering how it was out in the middle of scenic nowhere. "Oh...Yukari asked me if I wanted to go."

Mayu laughed. "Oh, I guess those boring old things would be new and exciting to her, since she just moved in. _Anyways_," Mayu practically pranced over, "you should say yes. Going outside is good for you!"

Ia frowned. "Yeah, I will."

"And I want to come too," Mayu continued. "I want to finally meet this famous 'Yuzuki Yukari' in the flesh. Unless..." A sly look came over her eyes. "You want Yukari's company all to yourself?"

"I-it's not like that..."

"I know! I'm just kidding," Mayu laughed. "That means I can come too, right?"

-o-o-o-

And so, the day of the fair, Ia showed up with Mayu in tow. Ia's heart felt heavy; she was beginning to fear, in a way, that Mayu would monopolize all of Yukari's attention and leave Ia in the lurch, again. After all, she was far more popular than Ia was, and was much better at keeping people's attention. Part of Ia debated turning around and going back home. It wasn't too late to think of an excuse. Furthermore, the streets were getting more and more crowded. Why were there so many people outside? It's hardly as though this was Yamaha's first arts festival; they had one practically every month. Ia kept her head down and stared at her feet as she walked with Mayu, ignoring the white tents and crowds.

"Ah, Ia!" Yukari's voice. Ia looked up and saw her, dressed in that same black rabbit hoodie she wore the day she transferred in. Before Ia could reply, Yukari ran over towards her, her expression bright. "And...this is Mayu, right?" Yukari looked over at Mayu. "Nice to meet you! I'm Yukari."

Mayu smiled. "Nice to finally meet you too! Ia's been talking about you nonstop."

"No, I haven't..."

"Wow, really?" Yukari laughed. "But there's not much to tell about me. I guess I'll be hanging out with the two of you today?"

Ia searched Yukari's expression for any hint of disappointment that Mayu was tagging along, but she found nothing but cheery happiness. But then again, what had she been expecting? Of course Yukari wouldn't have a problem with hanging out with more people.

"Yup," said Mayu, sticking her hands in her pockets and glancing around. "It's your first time going to one of these, right? I've been to tons," she authoritatively slapped a hand to her chest, "so I'll show you and Ia around!"

-o-o-o-

Mayu kept an eye on Ia and Yukari as the three of them made their way through the fair. It was so unusual to see her stepsister actually outside that Mayu couldn't help it - she _had_ to meet this Yukari person who dragged Ia out of her cave. From what she saw so far, Yukari was nice enough. Mayu didn't really get Ia's strange infatuation with the girl, but the two of them got along well, which was something that was rare for Ia. Ever since Mayu met her, Ia had been a recluse. Now, however, walking with Yukari, she looked normal.

But there was a problem. Ia looked more content with Yukari than anyone else - so much that Mayu felt a little uneasy. Something nagged at her - what if Yukari wasn't really as nice as she made herself out to be? What exactly made her approach and make friends with someone as reclusive as Ia? A transfer student typically knew who to stay away from, and Ia sent out all the signals - sitting by herself every lunch, reading during class, going straight home once school ended. Her actions combined with her body language practically screamed 'stay away from me'.

Except, Yukari didn't, and Ia was getting more and more attached to her. Not that there was anything wrong with that; it was fun teasing Ia about liking Yukari. But at the same time, what if Yukari couldn't be trusted? In a town as small as this, it was easy to ruin someone's reputation forever. Of course, Yukari is too new here to actually hold any malicious intent towards Ia, but there was always the possibility that her friendship with Ia wasn't made out of pure motives. Thinking about it in a certain way, Ia could be an attractive friend to have. Being a recluse, she would probably latch on and be loyal to the first friend she made. Beyond that, Yamaha was a relatively well-off town, and Ia and Mayu were accordingly relatively well-off. In addition, Ia was pretty smart, and she seemed like the type of person who would let people she liked walk all over her. All sorts of horrible possibilities presented themselves in Mayu's mind, even as she herself rambled on about the fair. She had been to enough that she could give a tour on autopilot.

"This is the Clock Garden," said Mayu. "Normally this area is just a road, but today they laid grass and plants over it and stuff."

"Why do they do that?" Yukari asked, carefully stepping around the clock in the center.

Mayu laughed. "Well, it's an arts festival! The gardeners want to show off too."

"This is a lot of work to be done each month," Ia commented.

"That's why the cost of living here is so high," said Mayu, glancing back at Yukari. "We have to keep all the old people who live here happy."

Yukari laughed. "Oh, that explains a lot."

"What does it explain?" Ia looked confused.

Yukari blinked, looking momentarily taken off guard. "Oh...uh, nothing important. I mean, it explains why there's not much people in school...less than normal for a town this big."

"Do you move around a lot?" Mayu asked.

Yukari looked away. "Yeah...sort of."

A flash of alarm passed over Ia's face. "Does that mean you're going to leave soon?"

Yukari, jolted out of whatever mood she was in, looked over at Ia. "Oh...no, we're planning on staying here for a while longer." She laughed and reached a hand out to Ia's shoulder before quickly drawing it back without it making contact. Weird. Not to mention, kind of awkward. _Guess Ia still has those touch issues,_ Mayu thought.

"Anyways!" Mayu clapped her hands together and grinned at the two of them. "Let's get something to eat. We're getting close to the area where they sell food. You can smell it, right?" Mayu closed her eyes and waved her hand under her nose.

Ia's eyes were fixed on Yukari's hand. "Oh...right. Are you hungry?"

Yukari stuck her hands back into her pockets and Ia's eyes flicked up to meet her's. "Yeah, I'm hungry," said Yukari cheerily. Apparently she had decided to ignore the awkwardness until it went away. Mayu frowned inwardly, though she pasted on a smile outside.

"Great!" Mayu enthused. "I'm down for yakisoba first. Let's go!"

-o-o-o-

"This is _so_ bad for you, but it's good," Mayu rambled as she slurped up her noodles. "So tell me more about yourself, Yukari! I feel like I've been talking all day."

Yukari laughed and shook her head. "There's not a lot that's interesting about me."

Mayu shook her head. "That's not true. You seem pretty interesting, Yukari. Hey," Mayu glanced up at her, "do you want to hang out sometime? We should get to know each other! I want to know Ia's friends too."

Next to Yukari, Ia went rigid as she stared at her yakisoba.

Yukari grinned. "I'm always okay with hanging out. Where do you want to go?"

Mayu put a finger to her lips. "Well, I always have to drag Ia there, but there's a nice tea shop I go to a lot."

"Oh," Yukari snapped her fingers, "I've been there! Ia took me. It's pretty good!"

"Ahh, is that so?" Mayu looked over at Ia. "Your friend has good taste!"

Ia stared at her yakisoba, concentrating on breathing in and out. For some reason, she didn't especially want Mayu and Yukari to hang out together, but there was no way she could just outright say that. Not when Yukari looked so happy at the prospect of making a new friend. "Yeah, she does."

"Well, it's a date then!" Mayu clapped her hands together. "I'm so excited."

At the word 'date', a cold chill ran down Ia's spine, but she forced herself to calm down. Mayu didn't mean an _actual_ date, of course. That was how people normally talked when they set up times to meet up, right? Ia numbly ate some of her food. It was tasteless in her mouth.

"We can go and watch a movie too," Mayu continued. "Ia told me that you liked movies. I love movies!"

"Really?" Yukari asked. "Which ones?"

And with that, Yukari and Mayu launched into a deep and detailed discussion of movies, a subject that Ia knew very little about. They talked about actors, actresses, and awards. Names like Spielberg, Fincher, and Nolan dropped out of their mouths - names that Ia was too unfamiliar with to add anything new to the conversation.

Ia poked at her food with a chopstick, her appetite entirely gone. It was happening, she realized dully. What she had feared was happening. It made a lot more sense that Yukari would have more fun talking with Mayu than with someone as boring as Ia. And besides, right now, the two of them didn't even _need_ Ia here to have a good time - they had their movies, a million in-jokes at their fingertips without even having to really know each other. They could just reference a movie and have hours of conversation about just that. Not only that, but Mayu had absolutely no problems about being touched like Ia did. And she definitely wouldn't be feeling anything like what Ia felt whenever Yukari touched her.

The more Ia thought about it, the blacker her mood got, until she couldn't stand it anymore. She had to get up. She had to leave. Staying here wasn't doing her any favors, and seeing her stepsister and Yukari get along so well, far from making Ia feel good, made her feel awful.

It was at that moment when Yukari turned towards Ia, seeming to realize that she hadn't spoken in a while. "You okay?"

Ia said nothing. Yukari leaned in and Ia almost flinched when she felt her breath brush her ear.

"I'm glad we came," said Yukari. "I had fun today."

Ia couldn't help it. She scoffed. At that, Yukari's face scrunched up in confusion. "Are you alright?"

"I'm great," said Ia, getting up from her seat. "I'm going to go dump my food, be back in a bit." That said, Ia hurried off from the table and melted into the crowd, not sure where she was going, but willing to go anywhere if it meant not hearing another second of how much Yukari was enjoying spending her time with Mayu.

"Ia, wait!" Yukari's voice. Ia lowered her head and walked faster, but Yukari's hand on her arm stopped her from moving. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong," Ia muttered. "I'm just dumping my food."

"If you're just dumping your food," said Yukari, "why did you leave it at the table? Ia, come on," Yukari gently turned Ia around so that she was facing her, hesitating slightly before placing her fingers under Ia's downturned chin and making her look up at her. Ia fought the urge to push her away - she had the feeling that doing that would only reset all the progress they made. So instead, Ia tried to ignore the sudden hammering of her heart. "Did I do something wrong? Was it something I did?"

"No," Ia said, edging away from Yukari's fingertips. Yukari sighed and let her hands drop down to her sides.

"Whatever I did, I'm sorry," said Yukari. "I didn't mean to make you upset. What's wrong? Are you leaving? If you can wait here, I'll go back and get my stuff. We can leave together."

Before Ia could stop it, she spoke. "Why? Don't you want to talk about movies more with Mayu?" Even as the words left her mouth, Ia couldn't help but to cringe inwardly. She sounded so obviously resentful.

Yukari laughed. "So I _was_ right." She took a step closer to Ia. "When I sent you that text, I meant that I wanted to go to the fair today with you. Not with Mayu."

For a moment, Ia was certain that she had misheard. But Yukari was smiling at her again - that clear, sweet, simple smile that sent tingles up and down her spine. No one had ever smiled at Ia that way before, so fondly even though they had only known each other for barely a month, even though Ia had all her issues. Ia swallowed and looked down at the ground, unsure of what to say.

"How about next time," Yukari added, "it'll be just you and me?"

Ia, not trusting herself to speak, nodded.

"Great!" Yukari clapped her hands together. "Want to go back, get our stuff, and properly dump your food?" She held out a hand to Ia.

Ia stared at it for a few moments before looking back up at Yukari. "Why are you so nice to me? Even though I'm like this?"

"Because I'm your friend," Yukari answered with a grin. "Come on, let's go back. Don't want to leave all the clean up to Mayu, right?"


	5. Chapter 5

Mayu tapped her foot, counting the ticks of her watch as she leaned against a post and waited for Yukari in front of the tea shop. It was a school holiday, but as of now, the girl was five minutes late and counting. Mayu frowned. That was a strike against, in her book. Ia was always perfectly punctual. Sure, that might be attributed to her lack of a social life, but Mayu herself liked punctuality...especially when the weather was this hot. She fanned herself with her hand, a useless gesture against the solidness of the heat. Then, she spotted a wavy silhouette walking towards her - Yukari.

"Ah, hello!" said Mayu, quickly sliding on a smile to hide her impatience. "You're late! I was beginning to worry that you'll never come."

Yukari smiled sheepishly and shrugged. "Sorry, my train got delayed. I tried to come as soon as possible."

Oh. Well, if that was the case, Mayu couldn't really hold anything against her. Unless Yukari was lying, but there was no point in lying about something so small. "It's okay. So, there's the teashop," Mayu pointed at it. "Why don't we talk there?"

-o-o-o-

Once seated at the tea shop, Mayu ordered for the two of them, promising Yukari that she knew the place well and that what they were about to drink was undoubtedly the very best the place had to offer. True enough, all the workers there seemed to know Mayu by name, so Yukari figured that she might as well take her word for it.

"So," Mayu leaned forward on the table, smiling, "you're close with Ia, I take it?"

There was something about the way Mayu said those words that put Yukari on guard. Even though outwardly she was all smiles, and even though they had a nice conversation the other day about movies, there was a subtle undercurrent of _something_ under those words. Plus, Mayu was Ia's younger stepsister. Yukari shifted in her seat slightly before answering. "Yeah, we're close! We're pretty good friends."

"That's great," said Mayu, her smile growing wider. "Especially since Ia never really had any friends. All she does is stay in her room all day, so she never really got to do the stuff that most girls would do...you know, like hang out with friends or get crushes."

Yukari laughed. "Oh, getting crushes is overrated. Ia is a good person."

Mayu blinked, interest seemingly piqued. "Overrated? Why, do you speak from personal experience?"

"Uh...sort of, I guess," Yukari quickly pushed the topic away. "A-anyways, at the fair you told me you were going to see _Oblivion_, right? How was it?"

"It was okay, a lot better than I expected," said Mayu. "The set designs were really impressive."

Yukari breathed an inward sigh of relief at the seemingly successful dodge. "Yeah, the trailers made it look really high-budget. Everything's so sleek. I heard there's a lot of plot twists too, right?"

Mayu nodded. "Right. One of them's really obvious since the trailers gave it away, but there are a few others that are pretty out there, though, it was kind of similar to this other sci-fi movie I watched...anyways!" Mayu clapped her hands together as cups of tea were placed before them, "our tea is here. This is my absolute favorite - royal milk tea."

Yukari looked at it. "It looks like normal milk tea."

"It's different! Royal milk tea tastes more sophisticated."

Yukari wasn't sure if sophistication was something one could actually taste, but she decided to take Mayu's word for it. "Ahh...I see." Yukari took a sip. It did taste different from milk tea, to be sure - at very least, it tasted creamier.

"See? Can't you tell once you taste it? You should taste it before you make judgments about what it looks like, you know. It's actually quite dangerous if you don't," Mayu said. "For example, what if I gave you a glass of orange juice, and another glass of orange juice mixed with vodka? They look exactly the same, but one of them has vodka in it! Milk tea and royal milk tea is like that, except royal milk tea isn't mixed with vodka or anything."

Yukari blinked. "It can be dangerous if you do, too. What if I gave you a glass of orange juice, and another glass of orange juice mixed with poison? If you taste it, you're dead."

Mayu raised her eyebrows. "Wow, that's unexpectedly dark of you, Yukari." A small smile spread on her face. "Ah, don't tell me, there's a secret 'dark Yukari' waiting to come out?" Mayu giggled, seemingly tickled by this turn of events. "No one can be as upbeat and as cheery as you seem to be all the time. People aren't robots. They don't have their mood set on happy 24/7."

Yukari furrowed her eyebrows. These conclusions Mayu were jumping to were way too far off. "I'm not happy _all_ the time, I was just happy at the fair because Ia and I had made up and were hanging out."

"Oh, minor details," Mayu waved a hand before looking at Yukari and pointing a finger at her. "I'm onto you, Yuzuki Yukari. Why are you friends with Ia?"

"Why?" Yukari gaped at her. "What do you mean, 'why'?"

"You're a transfer student, so naturally you want to make friends with the people who seem the coolest, right? So why Ia? No one ever talks to her at school, so it's weird. I've been wondering that for a while, honestly."

Why Ia? Yukari looked down and stared at her hands. She had just seemed so bored and lonely, sitting by herself, reading books during class. Everyone else was ignoring her, as though she didn't even exist. And being treated like you didn't exist was painful. Everyone wants to fit in, have friends, and have fun. Being an outsider could leave scars - anxiety, fear, no confidence. All Yukari wanted was to push Ia out into the world. She was too lonely for Yukari to merely watch for long. And besides...

Yukari shook her head, getting herself out of that mental space. "I'm friends with Ia because I like her," said Yukari, simply. "I started talking to her because she looked like she would be a good friend."

Mayu raised her eyebrows. "Oh really?"

Yukari nodded. "Yes."

"Even with all her issues?"

Yukari shook her head. "We can handle them."

Mayu's lips quirked. "You're a bit too nice for your own good. Try not to get worn out, okay?"

"Worn out?"

Mayu shrugged. "People can get tired of constantly helping. I don't know why you're friends with Ia, but dealing with her can be hard sometimes. I'm her stepsister, so I would know. I would hate to see her put her trust in someone only for them to get tired of her."

Yukari stared at Mayu, the words taking a moment to fully process in her brain. Once they did, Yukari paused a little more to gather her thoughts. "Wait...you think I'd get tired of her?"

"It's possible."

"There's no way that'll happen!" Yukari shouted, before realizing that she was in a teashop. She lowered her voice accordingly. "I'm not that kind of person."

"No one thinks they're that kind of person, that's the point of me telling you to not get worn out," Mayu said. "Ia's older than me, but I've been watching over her since we were kids."

Yukari shook her head. "Why haven't you tried to get her out in the world more often, then?"

"I did try," said Mayu. "Ia was happy where she was back then. She didn't need people."

Yukari wanted to throw up her hands. "That's not true. Everyone needs people. Humans are social."

Mayu sighed. "Yukari, you've only known Ia for a month. I've known her for years, and I'm telling you that she was happy back then. I tried to get her to go out, but she always said no, so I kind of stopped trying as much. She only started going outside once you came in."

"But isn't that a good thing?"

"Maybe," said Mayu. "I don't know. She's a lot moodier these days. Like it or not, Yukari, you're responsible for this. So you need to pay attention to her. You can't just walk into her life, shake it up, and then leave."

"I wasn't planning on doing that in the first place," Yukari snapped, irritation sparking inside her. "Who do you think I am? Of _course_ I'll help her. Ia's my friend. There's no way I'm going to leave her alone. Sure, we haven't known each other too long, but I really like her, okay?"

Then, to Yukari's surprise, Mayu started laughing. Yukari stared as Mayu's shoulders shook for several long moments. Irritation faded, rapidly replaced with concern. Maybe Mayu was crying? It was hard to tell, since her face was down. Yukari hesitantly reached out a hand.

"Hey, are you...okay?" Yukari asked.

Mayu looked up, still giggling a little. "Me? I'm perfect. You're a nice person, Yukari. I can see why Ia likes you so much." There was a little extra emphasis on the word 'likes'.

"Oh...um, thanks?"

Mayu nodded. "No problem. So, I'm going to ask you a random question. I promise that it has nothing to do with Ia's social issues."

"Sure," said Yukari, relieved to get away from the topic. "What is it?" She took a sip of her tea, now cold.

"Well, earlier, you brought up crushes being overrated, so I was just wondering" said Mayu as she idly swirled her tea, spoon clinking against the edges of the cup, "do you like girls?"

Yukari choked on her tea.

-o-o-o-

Today had not been a good day for Ia, though it started out relatively normally. Ia woke up early, as usual. Her dad and stepmother were out, as usual, so Ia shuffled over to the kitchen and made herself and Mayu breakfast. The two of them ate in relative silence, Ia's mind still too much of a sleepy fuzz for her to really think of anything to say, and Mayu's mouth was occupied with her eggs. Then, Mayu looked at the clock.

"Oh," she exclaimed, "I have to meet with Yukari at the teashop today."

At the mention of the name Yukari, Ia looked up. "Huh? Today? But the fair was yesterday!"

"What's wrong with meeting people two days in a row?" Mayu asked with a grin. "Besides, this time, it'll be just Yukari and me."

Ia scowled at that and continued eating her food. "I was just saying..."

"Aw, poor Ia," Mayu patted her on the head. "Don't worry! I'll tell you everything about how it went."

"Whatever," Ia mumbled. "Stop patting my head."

After Mayu left, Ia lounged around the house, not sure what to do. She listened to some new songs she got, idly toyed with the idea of making mixes from those songs, and watched television. Despite doing all that, each song seemed to take eternity, and every television program she looked at was boring. Not even the internet helped. Her every thought was focused, laser-like, on what Mayu and Yukari were doing. Visions of Yukari spontaneously realizing how much better company Mayu was than Ia danced through Ia's mind. Maybe after this, Yukari wouldn't even _want_ to hang out with Ia anymore. Sure, the day before, Yukari had reassured her that she came to the fair to see her, but now that Mayu and Yukari were meeting up together without Ia, Ia wasn't sure what to think.

It was horrible. Her mood got blacker and blacker as the day went on. By the time Mayu came home, Ia was sitting on the couch blankly staring at a TV interview.

"Oh, hey," said Mayu as she glanced at the television, "I didn't know Hatsune Miku was going to release a new single!"

"How was your 'thing-thing' with Yukari?" Ia asked, dryly.

Mayu looked at Ia for a moment before hopping on the couch, gold eyes inquisitive and mischievous. "Oh, repeating my words now? Ah," Mayu's hands flew to her mouth in mock-surprise, "it can't be...are you _jealous?"_

Ia looked away. "No..."

"When you lie, you should at least _try_ to make an effort," Mayu sighed and leaned back against the couch. "Honestly, Ia."

"Why did you go to the teashop with her in the first place?" Ia asked, still looking away.

"Why? I told you! I want to get to know your friends too."

Ia clenched her hands into fists. "Then why don't you get to know Oliver or something? Or Piko? Or Sonika? Why does it have to be Yukari?"

Mayu blinked at her. "Yukari is the person you bring up the most. You barely talk about anyone else. Isn't it natural to want to know the friends of your friends?"

Ia examined her toes and said nothing.

"I didn't think you'd be _this_ upset," Mayu sighed. "Why are you so angry?"

"I'm not mad," said Ia. "I'm just..." _scared_, she didn't say. "I don't know."

"Right..." Mayu leaned forward and peered into Ia's face. "Say, Ia, do you _like_ Yukari?"

Ia stiffened and stared at Mayu. "Wh-what?"

"Yeah, you know, do you like Yukari?"

Ia looked away. "She's my friend, so of course I like her."

Mayu rolled her eyes. "That's not what I meant. You're a bit too into her. It's kind of obvious, though I don't think she picked up on it yet."

Ia's eyes widened and she whirled around to face Mayu. "Y-you didn't tell her, right?"

"Of course not. I wasn't sure."

"Mayu," Ia gripped Mayu by the shoulders, "you _can't_ tell her."

"Why not?" Mayu winced at Ia's grip.

"Why not?" Ia repeated in disbelief. "Because we're friends! I can't tell her this...it'll ruin everything. Yukari'll never want to talk to me again."

Mayu rolled her eyes. "I think you're going to need some more statements to back up that assumption."

Ia let go of Mayu's shoulders in disgust and turned away. She didn't understand. How could Ia explain? For Mayu life was easy, but it wasn't like that for Ia. Even just _talking_ to new people was a feat, so what made Mayu think that Ia could just easily get over her issues and cheerfully confess to Yukari? Besides, Yukari probably didn't even feel the same way, so all it would accomplish was make both parties uncomfortable. There was absolutely no point. All Ia could do was bury her feelings. "Whatever. I don't want to talk about this anymore."

Mayu heaved a sigh. "Fine, fine," she held up her hands, "I'm backing off." She turned back towards to the television, where the interview was still going on. Ia dully looked at it.

"Working with Luka had been an amazing experience," said Miku on the television, a happy idol's smile on her face. "She's new, but she's incredibly talented! We're both really looking forward to releasing our single."

Ia sighed and flopped back on the couch. She bet Miku didn't have these problems.

-o-o-o-

"So...how was drinking tea with Mayu?" Ia asked Yukari before school.

Yukari frowned and thought. It wasn't so much drinking tea as it was an interrogation. It was one of the more exhausting outings Yukari had been on so far. That random question Mayu asked at the very end didn't help either. Had her comment about crushes really been _that_ suspicious?

"It went okay," Yukari answered. "The tea was good. I didn't know royal milk tea existed until then."

Ia nodded. "Apparently it's a thing. I thought it was just a fancy brand name, but I guess it's an actual thing."

Yukari looked at Ia and smiled at her. "I suppose so. Though, I like hanging out with you a lot more."

Ia's eyes widened as a small blush spread on her cheeks. She looked rather becoming, and Yukari was aware of a blush spreading on her own cheeks at the sight. Swallowing Yukari quickly looked away, wondering why she was blushing. Maybe because it was so cold.

"Th-thanks, Yukari," Ia stammered. "I like hanging out with you too."

"Whoa! You guys are up here early," Piko said as he opened the door, something in the room leaving the moment he came in. "Catching up on homework?"

For the first time, Yukari felt irritated at Piko. That atmosphere of calm privacy was completely gone. Though, it wasn't his fault, so Yukari pushed her irritation away. There was no point in getting angry at her friend.

"Morning Piko," said Ia.

"Morning," Yukari echoed.

With a loud grunt the boy put his backpack on the table. "It's pretty boring going to school so early," he yawned. "No one around, nothing to do..."

"Why are you here so early then?" Yukari asked.

Piko winced. "Well, I haven't finished my homework yet, so I came here to get it done early...hey, did any of you get the fifth problem for math? I'm having so much trouble with it it's not even funny...seriously, why do we have to learn this discrete math stuff?"

Yukari winced. She herself hadn't finished her homework. "Uh...sorry...I can't help you there."

Ia looked puzzled. "That one's not hard."

"Says you," mumbled Piko. "Us normal people can't quite keep up with you geniuses..."

Yukari felt a brief flare of anger at Piko for saying that - it sounded so resentful and after everything Mayu said, Yukari didn't want Ia to get hurt - but she swallowed it. Piko was sort of joking and Ia didn't even look offended so it's pointless if Yukari chewed Piko out over it anyways.

Ia shrugged. "Well, I'll help you out on it. Take out your paper."

"Ah, thanks Ia," Piko said, taking out the paper and pointing at the problem in question. "This one..."

Ia, in a smooth, elegant movement, brushed her hair back behind her ear as she bent over to look over the assignment. Yukari found herself staring at Ia, who was bending over with some strands of pale hair falling down over her ear, her intelligent blue eyes concentrated, her pink lips moving as she quietly explained something to Piko, and suddenly Yukari found her throat dry. The room seemed strangely hot. Shaking her head Yukari got up from her chair and walked around the classroom, stuck her head out the window to stare out at the school campus.

Soon she heard the sound of the door opening again as more students shuffled into the room, slowly and lethargically, lazy from the sleep.

"Good morning," said an enthusiastic voice right next to Yukari's ear, and gasping Yukari shot her head up and stared right into the eyes of Nakajima Gumi.

"M-morning Gumi," Yukari stammered. "You startled me."

Gumi laughed a little. "That's what I do! You looked a little spaced out."

"Oh...it's just that, it was pretty hot in the classroom earlier so I had to stick my head out the window a little," Yukari said.

Gumi frowned a little. "Hm, really? That's unusual, it's usually pretty well air-conditioned in the room."

Yukari shrugged. "I don't know. I was just saying."

"Eh, Piko, you're still doing your homework?" Sonika's voice floated over to the two of them, obviously disapproving. "And you roped in Ia to help too."

"Hey, Ia's the one who offered to help," Piko protested. "Right, Ia?"

"Right, but..." Ia heaved a sigh, "you're spending way too much time on problem number five."

"Wow, really?" said Sonika. "It is a simple problem. You need to study more."

"St-stop making me feel bad, guys," Piko mumbled. "Okay, okay, everyone, clear out. I gotta concentrate on doing my homework before class starts."

Yukari checked her watch. "Good luck with that...class starts in three minutes."

"Oh man," Piko put his head on his desk, "it's over...it's all over..." His pencil moved desultorily on the page. "Why is set theory so hard...why do we even need to study it? This is so lame."

"It's about to get lamer for you," Gumi laughed as she sat down on her chair. "Apparently we have a pop quiz today on the homework."

"What? Seriously? That's horrible!" Piko waved his arms around. "Stuff like that just shouldn't be allowed!"

"Well, it is the day after a holiday, so you should have seen this coming," said Sonika. "Holidays don't come without consequence. Anyways, shouldn't be spending your time on finishing your homework?"

"Right," said Ia, looking rather confused. "You're almost there. I'll give you a hint, it's a proof by contradiction and the answer is 'true'."

Sonika groaned. "It's not a hint if you just give him the answer..."

"Well, he still needs to do the proof, but the proof is easy," said Ia.

"Uh..." Piko stared at his paper. "Easy for you, maybe..."

It was at that moment when the teacher entered the room. Piko gasped and quickly scribbled something down on his paper before passing it up, heaving a sigh of relief once he got it in.

Yukari glanced over at him, and then she looked down at her own incomplete homework. There was a time when she tried like that. But now, Yukari thought as she passed her homework up, whatever. She was too far behind to catch up, anyways. Too much moving from town to town, all those different curricula. She took out her notebook anyways. Better to keep appearances.


	6. Chapter 6

"I'm so _bored_," SeeU whined over the phone.

"Don't you have homework to do?" Yukari asked as she half-heartedly started on her homework. The questions on it might as well be an impenetrable wall. Still, Yukari managed to get a few of the easier ones up top, but the more involved ones...she had nothing.

SeeU huffed out a breath. "I already finished it!"

"Good for you, then," Yukari mumbled as she doodled circles in the margins. SeeU was smart, and Yukari liked her a lot, but sometimes she wished that she wasn't so...no. Yukari stopped that train of thought. Yukari's current dismal academic performance had nothing to do with SeeU, and she shouldn't blame her friend for anything, least of all being responsible and getting her homework done.

"Hm? Did you say something?"

Oops. Yukari hadn't meant for SeeU to hear that. "Oh...it's nothing!" Yukari quickly forced a laugh. "It's just that this new curriculum is really confusing. They're learning set theory. We did combinatorics, right?"

"That's right," SeeU confirmed. "We did set theory before you transferred here."

"Oh! So if you put it that way, I'm ahead."

SeeU snorted. "You copied like, all of my homework to pass. That's not really 'ahead'."

Yukari winced. That was true, but Yukari had been doing homework by herself since then. Especially since her teachers at Artech became suspicious of Yukari's perfect homework grades compared to her horrible exam grades. "Uh, yeah, I guess not. Well...moving on! If you already did set theory, can you help me with my homework since you're done with your's?"

"Let me see..." Yukari could practically sense SeeU grinning over the phone, her tone becoming teasing. "I don't know...are you a good enough friend to deserve my help?"

Time to turn up the charm. Or rather, as much charm Yukari could manage over the phone. "SeeU, you're the _best_," she said. "Since you're such a wonderful person, of course you'll help your poor, struggling friend out with her homework so that she won't fail...right?"

"Hmm," SeeU mused, "watching the next episode of _Running Man_, or doing set theory...this is a tough decision."

Yukari pushed a little harder. "Please?"

"Well," said SeeU. "When you put it that way, okay. What's the problem?"

"Oh my god, thank you so much," Yukari said, flipping to her questions. There were so many problems, Yukari wasn't sure where to start, but after some examination, she figured that the first question was as good as any. "Okay, so the first one asks that, for any set A, B, C, and D, if A is a subset of B and C is a subset of D, is A-cross-C a subset of B-cross-D?"

"Well," said SeeU, "A-cross-C has to be a subset of B-cross-D, because both of the sets involved are subsets of B and D. I mean, you knew enough to figure that out, right?"

"I knew that," Yukari protested, even though she didn't really, but it sounded obvious once SeeU put it that way with that tone of voice. "I just don't know how to prove it's correct."

There was the sound of rustling over the phone, as if SeeU was unwrapping something. "Right, I remember you having trouble with those at Artech too. Okay, I'll walk you through part of it, and you can do the rest on your own. Sound good?" Without waiting for Yukari to answer, SeeU launched into her explanation. Yukari tried to scribble down as much as it as she could. "...so after you get any number x and any number y, what do you do?"

Yukari thought about it as she stared down at her myriad notes. Then, it struck her. "Oh! Oh, I get it!" She hurriedly scrambled to write it down. "It was so _obvious_, I don't know how I didn't..."

"Yup," said SeeU as she munched on something. "It's always obvious after you get it."

"SeeU," said Yukari, awed, "could you help me with _all_ my homework?"

"As appealing as doing twice the amount of homework sounds, I'll have to pass."

"Well...it was worth a try," said Yukari with a laugh as she started writing down her answers to the rest of the questions. Hopefully she could muddle her way through them without taking too big of a grade hit. "What are you eating, anyways?"

"Shrimp chips."

"Ohh," Yukari stopped writing, "those are good!"

"Yeah, I remember bribing you to do your homework with these," said SeeU. "I'd give you some as a reward for finishing that problem, but you're kind of far."

"Not _that_ far! You could totally come and visit," said Yukari.

SeeU laughed. "Yes, because I'd take the train all the way to Yamaha just to give you shrimp chips."

"Why not?" said Yukari as she continued doing the rest of her homework. There was a silence for a few minutes, interspersed by SeeU eating her chips.

"So," said SeeU, "how are things going with Ia?"

Yukari paused. "Ia? Ia's fine. I think her stepsister dislikes me, though. She like, interrogated me at the tea shop the other day. Like, she asked some really weird questions."

"Oh really? What'd she ask?"

"She asked me why I wanted to be friends with Ia. It's a strange question, don't you think? You don't normally ask why people become friends with others."

"Well," said SeeU, "I don't see why you want to be friends with her either. She made you upset for _days_ that one time."

Yukari shook her head. "That wasn't her fault. It was my fault for not knowing that she was uncomfortable. I was the one who overstepped my boundaries."

"Geez," SeeU's voice became irritated, "you're such a pushover! I mean, what's so great about Ia in the first place? From what you told me, she sounds like a, no offense, total loser. Does she even do anything, you know, _fun?_ She's never been to the mall, she doesn't watch movies, she's completely antisocial to the point where she hates being touched. Like, seriously? Why do you want to be friends with her?"

Yukari winced. SeeU painted a pretty damning picture of Ia, but how could Yukari express that there was more to her than that? "I-"

"Like, do you feel bad for her? I mean, I understand that you're a bleeding heart kind of girl," SeeU continued, "but you can't really be friends with someone if you just pity them."

"I don't just pity her," Yukari said. "Look, you...it's hard to understand if you haven't met her."

"How about you give it a shot," said SeeU. "From what you told me so far, I'm not impressed."

Yukari took a breath and imagined Ia in her mind. How could she possibly distill her down to a simple description? Ia was complicated. Yukari usually considered herself a relatively good read of people, but she didn't really understand Ia that well, even after all this time. Ia was quiet, intelligent, hard-working, musical, a little childish sometimes, but that was cute. Actually, Ia on the whole was really cute in general - she had a delicate, glass-spun appearance, fragile and beautif-

"Yukari?" SeeU said. "Kind of quiet over there."

"Oh. Oh!" Yukari felt the blood rush to her face. Did she just go off on a reverie about her friend? Yukari swallowed. There was that thing during class too, when Ia was helping Piko out with his homework. Shit. Better not think too much about that. "S-sorry, I uh, I was thinking."

"You had to think _that_ long to think of something good about her?"

Yukari's cheeks heated up even more. Quite the opposite. But she couldn't wait any longer, so she just started rambling. "Okay. Ia might be quiet, but she's a good person. I don't know why she doesn't do that much, maybe something happened, I'm not sure, maybe she was born that way, but right now the quietness is just part of her personality, and that's _completely_ okay. She is who she is and I don't want to change that. She's really smart too, and she does do things. She reads a lot, more than anyone else I know, and she's really into music! Like, she makes a ton of music mixes and I think she plays instruments, though I think she's shy about it, so she doesn't talk about it much. She's really sweet once you get to know her!"

"So?" said SeeU. "I read a lot, I'm into music, and I'm smart too, but I don't remember you trying this hard to be friends with me."

Yukari laughed. "Wow, you're modest. Anyways, it's because you're outgoing! You're not like Ia at all, she's...a lot shyer. So I have to try harder, right?"

"Geez," SeeU muttered. "Well, whatever. I'm going to watch _Running Man_ now, so I'll talk to you later or something."

"SeeU!" Yukari said, appalled. "You're abandoning me?"

"Well, you seem like you have the homework in the bag," said SeeU, her tone flat. "And besides, from what you said yourself, Ia's smart too. You could just ask _her_ for help, right?"

Yukari winced. SeeU sounded vaguely annoyed, though Yukari had no idea why. "Wait. Are you okay? You're not mad or anything, right?"

"I'm not mad at all," said SeeU. "I'll talk to you later, okay?"

"Are you sure? Wait-"

"Go do your homework, Yukari." And with that, SeeU hung up.

Yukari put her phone down with another sigh. What was _up_ with SeeU, anyways? Maybe Yukari had asked her for homework help too many times. She wouldn't be surprised, honestly. But still, if Yukari had overstepped her boundaries, all SeeU had to do was tell her. Yukari felt a jolt of self-loathing shoot down her spine. It seemed like the only thing she could do these days was ignore people's boundaries. First Ia, now SeeU. This burgeoning..._thing_ that Yukari was beginning to feel towards Ia didn't help either, and thanks to that, Yukari wasn't too eager to take SeeU's advice and call up Ia. Yukari sighed and, in an effort to take her mind off her own failings, glanced at her math problems. She had ten more to go. She then looked at her as of yet unexamined English homework. The way her patchwork education was now, there was no way she'd be able to do both.

"Shit," Yukari mumbled.

-o-o-o-

Ia couldn't concentrate on her homework. The problems, normally trivially easy, blurred together in her mind. Ia put her head on the table. Ever since, well, _everything_, Ia's mind was preoccupied with Yukari. Mayu blatantly putting Ia's crush on her in words the other day didn't help either, and after how jealous Ia got of Mayu and Yukari, not just once, but _twice_, there was really no point in even denying the fact that Ia had a definite crush on her friend.

Now that it was out there, it was as though her mind interpreted it as a free license to constantly have Yukari in the mind at all times. It was completely ridiculous and unproductive. Ia sighed and settled for doing one of the easier problems about Cartesian products of sets so that she wouldn't feel like she just wasted the past few moments.

"Ah, Ia," said Mayu as she walked in with two bowls of rice, "what a surprise to see you here."

"Uh...really? I was here since this afternoon."

"There are these things in life called 'jokes', Ia," said Mayu, setting Ia's bowl in front of her.

Ia glanced at it. "Wait, it's my turn to make dinner today."

Mayu shrugged. "You looked distracted."

"O-oh, I'm sorry-"

Mayu waved a hand. "It's fine." She went back to get the main dish - grilled mackerel, as it turned out - and sat at the table.

Ia cleared her papers from the table and started deboning her fish with her chopsticks. "I'll, um, make dinner for the next two nights."

"Yeah, sure," said Mayu. "But if you answer this question, I'll let you off the hook!" There was a mischievous grin on her face, one that promised trouble and meddling. Ia felt her heart sink.

"Don't tell me...you made dinner today so that I would answer whatever question you asked me?"

Mayu put on a wounded expression. "Ia, that's cold, accusing me of being so...so manipulative! Anyways, I just wanted to ask. Why don't you just cut all this moping about your supposedly unreturned crush on Yukari and ask her out?"

Ia gave Mayu a very dour look. "I thought you told me that you were going to back off."

"I changed my mind," said Mayu, unruffled.

"Like I said. You don't get it," mumbled Ia, feeling a wave of irritation wash over her. Didn't they just have this conversation the other night? When would Mayu stop?

"Don't get it? Of course I get it! You're talking to an expert on these things."

Ia rolled her eyes. "The last time you liked someone, you cornered his girlfriend after class and threatened her with craft scissors."

Mayu blinked. "Right, so I don't understand why you aren't listening to me."

"He _moved away."_

Mayu scowled. "That has absolutely nothing to do with the current situation, also known as you and Yukari. A lot of trouble would be saved if you simply communicated with each other."

Communicated with each other? What was there to communicate? How could Ia possibly communicate to Yukari that she had a crush on her without freaking her out? Besides, it was too early in Ia's estimation of things. She had only just started coming out of her shell, and Yukari was so popular, she could probably date anyone she wanted. It's not like Ia's blind - Yukari's pretty, beautiful even, and Ia wasn't going to kid herself about her own status. She liked Yukari too much to want to risk losing her, but at the same time, she liked Yukari too much to want to stay friends. But Ia wasn't selfish enough to push their friendship, and Ia's _only_ friendship, into awkward horribleness because of some stupid hormones and some stupid feelings. Ia decided that it was better to stay silent and focus on eating her dinner.

Mayu heaved another sigh. "Oh, so we're doing _this_ again."

Ia put a hand to her forehead and tried to calm down. What was Mayu's problem? Why was it so difficult for her to just leave Ia alone? Sure, Ia was trying to get out there more, trying to be more social, but that didn't give Mayu a free license to jump in her life and try to push her to do things faster. "Mayu, look, this is my problem, so I'll deal with it on my own."

"Ia, I know you," said Mayu. "You won't be dealing with anything. The only reason you're becoming more social in the first place is because this Yukari person walked in your life. If I left you up to your own severely undeveloped devices, you'd probably just have a sad crush on Yukari that you'll never act on."

It was like communicating with someone from another planet. As Ia thought, Mayu wouldn't understand. "Don't you ever think you're a little too interested in my love life?"

Mayu laughed. "Ia, you don't even _have_ a love life. But with my help, you just might be able to have one. You see where I'm going here, right?"

Ia shook her head and resisted the urge to shake Mayu. Trying to reason with her was like trying to reason with a determined deaf gorilla. "Don't pick on my words, Mayu, you know what I mean. Get off my back about Yukari."

"Great, so not only am I not allowed to talk with her, I'm also not allowed to help you spend more time with her?" said Mayu. "Don't you ever think you're acting a little bit, I don't know, insane?"

Ia's patience snapped. "Why are you even _interested?_ Before all this happened, you left me alone like everyone else!" Too driven by anger to think about what she was saying, Ia continued talking, ignoring Mayu's stunned expression. "It's only once Yukari started talking to me that you, that _any_ of you, started taking an actual interest in my life."

There was a silence. Ia breathed out, slowly feeling the anger recede and transform into regret. Shit. She did it again. Why did she always fuck up like this? What was wrong with her? Ia put a hand to her head and opened her mouth to speak, to apologize, but Mayu beat her to it.

"Wow, Ia," said Mayu. "Your memory is a bit too selective. I love how you conveniently forgot about all the times I invited you out to do things only for you to say no and stay inside doing whatever the hell you do."

"I...I know," said Ia. "I'm...um...I'm sorry."

Mayu shook her head. "I'm trying to help you here. Is this how you act around others?"

Ia's heart sunk to her stomach. She stared at her cold food. She could think of absolutely nothing to say. She hadn't meant to be so harsh to Mayu, but at the same time, she wished she would give her some space. Mayu was acting as though all this would be easy, like a game, but it wasn't a game. It was Ia's life. Surely there was a happy medium here. Ia closed her eyes and thought out her next words before speaking. "I'm sorry for what I said. I didn't mean it. But...it's just that I would appreciate it if you let me figure things out on my own, for a bit. It's just that right now, you're being..." Ia paused to think of a word, "overbearing."

Mayu let out a huff. "Well...fine. Apology accepted. But still, it's just..." Mayu shrugged. "I tried to get you to go out more often, but no matter what I tried, you always said no. Then this...Yukari person waltzed in and all of a sudden you're coming back home humming along to Sonika's songs while eating Oliver's cupcakes. To be honest? I'm a little jealous."

Ia's eyes widened. "O-oh." Right...during all this, she hadn't even considered what Mayu might be feeling. Another sting of guilt. "I'm sorry. Um...next time, if you want, w-when we're both free, we can...do something?"

Mayu winced. "Ia, stop, you sound like you're asking me out on a date."

"What? Ew! No!" Horrified, Ia wished she could grab those words and stuff them back into her mouth. "I didn't mean it _that_ way, we're related! I like Yukari!"

"Well, half-related," Mayu corrected. "And yes, I know, that's obvious from how you got insanely jealous several times now. Why're you so afraid of me hanging out with Yukari in the first place?"

"Well..." said Ia. She didn't especially want to tell her sister that she was afraid that Yukari would stop being friends with her. It sounded so childish and stupid and immature. But if they were going to be more honest with each other, Ia figured, she had to tell Mayu the truth. Ia owed her that much, at least. "I was scared that Yukari would like hanging out with you more, and stop being friends with me."

"Oh," said Mayu. "Oh, I see." She laughed. "Well, I do admit, I _am_ a lot better than you, that's for sure."

Ia half-smiled. "So you understand why I was afraid, right?"

"I understand, but I don't think you have anything to worry about, really," said Mayu. "Between you and me, you have a bigger chance with Yukari than you think."

Ia sighed. "Mayu-"

"No, but really," Mayu interrupted. "I don't know what kind of justifications you have going on in your head right now, but I'm pretty sure about this. Anyways, you don't have to tell her right away, I'm just putting it out there."

"Well, uh...okay," said Ia, unsure of how to interpret Mayu's words. What does 'bigger chance' even mean? And what made Mayu think that in the first place? "Thanks?"

Mayu examined her. "Well, it looks like you have absolutely no idea what I just said. Don't worry about it, Ia," Mayu got up from the table. "Take it easy."

"Right...okay," said Ia. She stared down at her untouched but meticulously deboned fish and with a sigh began to eat it.

She was almost done with her food when her cellphone rang. Ia answered it without looking at the caller ID. "Hello?"

"Um...hey, Ia," said Yukari, her voice sheepish. Ia immediately swallowed her food and sat straight up, even though Yukari couldn't see her. "Are you busy?"

"N-no, I'm just...I just finished eating," said Ia. "Why, um, is something wrong?"

"Uh...no, it's just..." Yukari sighed. "Nevermind. I need to figure this out on my own."

What? What was Yukari talking about? Did something horrible happen? Ia pressed the phone against her ear harder, as though by doing so she could summon Yukari into the room. "What's wrong? Tell me."

"It's really no big deal," said Yukari with a quick albeit forced laugh. "Ia, you sound so worried."

Ia frowned. "W-well, you don't sound okay."

"Oh, hm," Yukari mumbled. "Really?"

"I promise I'll help," said Ia, even though she had no idea what the problem was. The idea that she might not be capable of helping didn't occur to her. "What's wrong, Yukari?"

Yukari took a deep breath. "It's just...I'm having trouble with the homework...could you please help me?"

Ia blinked. "What?"

-o-o-o-

"Mayu!" Ia ran into the living room. "Yukari's coming over to study!"

"What?" said Mayu, looking over at the clock. "Now? It's like, ten. The new episode of _Yakou Kanransha_ is about to come on."

"You can watch it later," Ia said. "I need the living room."

Mayu rolled her eyes. "It's too comfy here. Can't you use your room? It's big enough."

Ia's room was currently a mess of cables, earphones, and CD albums. In other words, completely unacceptable. "No, it's too messy."

Mayu heaved a sigh. "Oh, very well." She gracefully rose to her feet, unnecessarily dusting off her clothes. "I see now that I must acquiesce to my older sibling in all things. Such is the nature of this cruel world."

"Um..." Ia remembered the talk they had earlier and promptly regretted her words for what seemed like the millionth time that day. "No, I'm sorry. You can stay if you want."

Mayu laughed. "No, I was kidding. I have a TV in my room. But if you insist, I suppose I can stay." With that, Mayu sat herself down on the couch and turned on the television, shifting and overall making herself very comfortable. Ia rolled her eyes and plopped herself down too, though she couldn't concentrate on the screen very well, her thoughts preoccupied with what to do when Yukari arrives. Yukari had sounded so upset over the phone. How could Ia help her? She wasn't the most emotionally savvy person in the world - Mayu was far better at that. But there was definitely something deeper going on than just homework. Ia didn't peg Yukari as the kind of person who would be horribly upset and nervous about asking someone for help with something as benign as that. What if there was something _really_ wrong? What if Yukari showed up at their doorstep crying? Ia's heart hurt at the thought of it.

"That new Rin single came out today," Mayu commented.

"Oh," said Ia, too distracted by her thoughts and worries to pay any attention to what Mayu was saying.

"Yeah, it's pretty good."

"Oh."

"Its release is sort of getting lost in all the recent drama with Luka and Miku, but it's a nice song. _Cinderella Syndrome_, you've heard of it, right?"

"Oh."

"You're the best conversationalist ever, I can see why Yukari hangs off your every word."

"Oh."

"Right, exactly."

The doorbell rang and Ia immediately jumped to her feet. "I'll get it!"

"Yes," said Mayu. "That's what I assumed."

Ia ran over to the door and practically threw it open. Standing on the doorstep was a very confused-looking Yukari, dressed in the same rabbit hoodie she wore the day she transferred in with a black and purple backpack slung over one shoulder. Ia examined her closely. She didn't _look_ sad...but what if she was just holding herself back?

"You answered really fast, huh," said Yukari with a laugh.

"Yukari," said Ia, "are you...okay?"

Yukari raised an eyebrow. "What? I'm fine. Sorry about that phone call, I guess I sounded really bad there."

Ia shook her head. "It's fine, you don't need to apologize...so you brought your homework?"

Yukari tugged on the strap of her backpack. "Yup, all here."

"Oh, that's...good," said Ia.

"Yeah, I wouldn't be so dumb as to forget my homework," Yukari grinned. Ia swallowed, hard. Yukari's smile was making her heart do acrobatics. How could she possibly invite someone as perfect as Yukari into her house?

"Y-yeah," Ia managed.

There was a silence as they stood there, Ia's heartbeat roaring in her ears, Yukari tapping her foot.

After some time, Yukari spoke. "Um...so are we going to do the homework at your doorstep, or..."

"Oh!" Shit, Ia could hit herself for being so stupid. "I'm sorry, yes, I mean, no, I mean..." Ia stopped herself and took a deep breath to regain her composure. "Yes, please come in." She stood back and opened the door wider, her face burning as she stared down at her feet. Yukari probably thought that Ia was a complete idiot right now. Ugh. Ia wanted to sink into the floor.

"Ah, thank you," said Yukari as she took off her shoes. Ia glanced up at her. Thankfully, Yukari didn't look annoyed or anything, more curious as she looked around and took in Ia's home, which Ia was now self-conscious of.

"Um, we'll be doing it in the living room, and Mayu's there. My room's a little messy, I'm sorry." Ugh. Why did she even apologize? In fact, why did she even bring up her room in the first place? All she had to say was that they would be doing homework in the living room.

"That's fine," said Yukari with a smile. "My room's a total mess too. So, homework?"


	7. Chapter 7

After getting her own homework, Ia led Yukari over to the living room, where Mayu was still watching the television. Once Ia and Yukari walked in, however, Mayu raised her head and smiled.

"Hey, Yukari!" said Mayu. "Doing homework with Ia, huh?"

Yukari laughed. "Yeah, sorry about the inconvenience. I know it's late."

"It's no problem," Mayu got up to her feet. "I'll go make some tea."

"I can make the tea," Ia said, dropping her things on the table.

Mayu rolled her eyes. "Ia, you're going to be doing homework. It's more time efficient if I make the tea. Also, it's a commercial break right now, so why not?"

Ia glanced over at the television, which was currently advertising some kind of dress line endorsed by Rin. "But...you made dinner today, and-"

"If you're so upset about it, you can make dinner _and_ tea for the next two days."

"Well, I don't really need anything to drink..." Yukari began. "If it's too much trouble, then-"

"No, Yukari, it's fine," said Mayu. "I always make tea at this time of day anyways. Nothing like sitting at home and drinking tea while watching dramas, right?" She waved a hand at Ia and Yukari. "You kids run along now and do your homework." That said, Mayu walked over to the kitchen, disappearing from view. Ia sighed and sat herself down at the table. Yukari did the same, sitting on the side adjacent to Ia, though she was careful to leave space between them. Always considerate, Ia thought.

"Are you done with all your homework?" Yukari asked.

Ia shook her head. "I was working on math, but I'm not done yet. I've finished everything else, though."

"Oh, cool," Yukari said, smiling. "I haven't finished math and I haven't even _started_ English. Do you want to begin with math, since we both have to do it?"

"Sure," said Ia. "The math problems today are easy, so we should be done with them fast."

"Easy, huh..." Yukari sighed. "Well, if you say so."

Ia frowned at Yukari's tone. All her worries about Yukari having some kind of problem flooded back into her mind. But was it appropriate to ask her right now? With how Yukari acted on the phone, and how she acted fine upon getting here, Ia felt that Yukari didn't especially want to talk about it. But at the same time, Ia wanted to help, if only to make Yukari happier.

But instead of saying something, Ia took out her homework. She didn't want to be pushy or annoying by making Yukari say more than she wanted to say. That was something Mayu would do. So Ia focused on her homework, letting the proofs and numbers flow into her brain so as to take her mind off the worries.

"Tea's ready!" said Mayu cheerily as she placed two mugs on the table. Ia, startled, looked up. Mayu was peering at the homework. "Oh, that looks hard. Ia, pay more attention to Yukari."

"Huh?" Ia said, baffled. "What do you mean?"

Mayu glanced at Ia's almost completed paper, then at Yukari's. "Yukari's only done five of the problems, and you're almost done with the entire thing."

"Oh!" Ia's eyes widened as she looked over at Yukari's paper. "I'm sorry. Yukari, do you need help?"

"Didn't she come over because she needed help?" Mayu sat herself down at the table.

Ia's heart sank. She was doing everything wrong today. She had never worked on homework with anyone before, so she wasn't sure how it was supposed to be done. She had assumed that once Yukari encountered a problem she didn't understand, she would ask for help. But was Ia supposed to help her with every problem? "What do you need help with, Yukari?"

"Um," said Yukari, staring down at her paper. "I'm not sure where to start with all this."

"Oh," said Ia. That wasn't very specific. She leaned over to look at Yukari's paper, breathing in the floral smell of Yukari's shampoo in the process. Ia tried to turn her mind away from that so that she could focus on the homework. Yukari had gotten the problem with Cartesian products of sets, which meant that she should have a basic understanding of the material. "So, you know what a subset is, right?"

"Yeah, it's when all elements in one set are in another set."

"Correct," said Ia. "So for this problem, where you need to prove that set A is the same as set B, you need to show that they are both subsets of each other."

"I am not looking forward to doing this next year," Mayu said with a sigh.

Yukari laughed. "It's awful, right?" She returned her attention to the homework, spinning her pencil. "I'm sorry for imposing, by the way...I usually ask SeeU for homework help, but I think she got mad at me."

"SeeU?" Mayu furrowed her eyebrows. "Who's that? Haven't heard of her before."

"Oh, she's not from around here," said Yukari. "She's my friend from Artech."

"Weird name. Is she Chinese?"

"Um, she's Korean, actually."

"Why is she angry with you?" Ia asked.

Yukari sighed. "I don't know. I think I might have asked her for homework help too much, and she got annoyed at me for that."

"Wow," said Mayu. "How often did you ask her for homework help?"

"Um...a lot. I mean, I can't blame her," said Yukari. "SeeU's really smart, and now that we're at different schools, she pretty much has to do twice the amount of homework when she helps me."

Ia frowned. Why would Yukari ask SeeU, someone who goes to a different school in a different town with a different curriculum, to help her with her homework when she had Ia here to help her? Was SeeU _that_ good academically? Or was Yukari just _that_ close to SeeU? The last thought was a rock in Ia's gut. Though a part of her knew that SeeU was Yukari's close friend, and that she was really only just getting to know Yukari now, another part of her felt that same sting she felt when Mayu and Yukari were getting along during the fair. Still, Ia knew she shouldn't be angry about this. Yukari had other friends in her life. That was fine too. Even though Ia admittedly wasn't too fond of SeeU after that unfortunate phone call, Yukari's friend was her friend. Ia took a breath and spoke. "You could have asked me for help. We're in the same class."

Yukari looked sheepish. "Like I said, I didn't want to impose. I wasn't sure if you were okay with it or not."

Ia stared at Yukari. "Why wouldn't I be okay with it? I helped Piko out with his homework. Why wouldn't I help you with yours? If you ever need help, you can always ask me."

Yukari's lip quirked. "Well...you might not say that after you find out how much help I need." She sighed and looked down at her paper. "I'm really behind because of all the curriculum changes from when I was moving around. Or maybe I'm just..." Yukari trailed off. Ia opened her mouth to ask for more details, but before she could say anything Yukari shook her head and plastered a smile on her face. "Well, whatever! Let's just focus on the homework we have now. It's getting kind of late." Yukari grabbed the paper and picked her pencil back up, almost knocking over her tea cup with her elbow. "Right, so I need to prove that A and B are subsets of each other?"

The subject change was so fast, Ia was left blinking. The chance to ask about why she moved around so much, to reassure her, to ask her about what she learned at other schools exactly, even to tell her that she could ask Ia for homework help no matter when it was or how often it was...Yukari had switched modes so quickly, the chances for those were all gone. "U-um..." Ia looked down at her homework. "Yeah. You kind of use the same method you use in problem one."

"Where you take a random variable x and y?"

"Well, since you're proving it one way first, and then the other, you only take one random variable x..." said Ia, her eyes fixed on Yukari. Her face was turned down, focused on the homework, bangs covering her eyes, expression unreadable. A complete mystery. What her family was like, what she wanted to do in the future, her hopes and dreams - it wasn't until now when Ia realized that she didn't know anything about any of those. Stupid. How could she confess to Yukari when their relationship was really like this? Ia stared at her hand. Wasn't the most basic form of human connection touch? If Ia was normal like everyone else, she could do something simple like reach out and place her hand on Yukari's.

But Ia wasn't normal. Even though she liked Yukari, her mind was freezing up at the thought of something as simple as reaching out to hold Yukari's hand. Stupid, Ia told herself. It wasn't as though they had never held hands before, but Yukari had always been the one to initiate it. Something exactly like this had happened at the tea shop that time too, and Yukari had done the exact same thing - brought up something that hinted towards something deeper, and then changed the subject before anyone could ask about it. But why? And how could Ia break past that barrier? She had to ask Yukari about it, confront her about it somehow, but...how could she voice it in a way that wasn't too confrontational?

"...Ia? Hey, Earth to Ia," Mayu's voice floated over. Ia looked up. Both Mayu and Yukari were staring at her. "You're really zoning out."

"O-oh," Ia put her hand down. "Sorry...um, do you have a question, Yukari?"

"Yeah," said Yukari, pushing her paper forward. "For problem number ten..."

-o-o-o-

It was eleven when they finished off the last of the math homework. Throughout it all, Yukari had carefully kept all conversation focused on homework problems. Though Yukari was skilled at not making any more ripples like she did earlier, Ia couldn't help but to feel uneasy. Every time she looked at Yukari's face, she wondered what Yukari was thinking underneath that perfectly practiced smile.

"Wow, that took a while," said Yukari, putting the math paper back into her bag and taking out the English paper. "But I think I get it a little better now. Thanks, Ia! I'll try not to bother you too much with homework problems."

"N-no," said Ia, quickly. "You can ask me any questions you want. I'll do my best to help."

"We still have English to do too," Yukari said. "How long is it?"

"It's not too bad," said Ia.

Yukari smiled. "Your definition of 'not too bad' is probably a lot different from mine."

"Argh," said Mayu. Ia and Yukari both turned to look at her. Ia had been so absorbed in the homework that she forgot Mayu was still there. "Can we take a break from all this homework junk? Seriously, have some consideration for me here."

"You're the one who wanted to stay," said Ia. "Weren't you watching that drama?"

"Yes, _Yakou Kanransha_, and yes, until it ended. Come on," Mayu straightened up, "let's do something fun!"

Ia looked at the clock. "It's kind of late. Yukari still needs to do English and get home."

"Come on, it'll be quick, promise. Besides," Mayu raised a finger, "you two need a break to properly refresh your minds, right?"

"Are you okay with it, Yukari?" Ia asked.

Yukari laughed. "I could use a break, definitely."

"Well, looks like it's decided then!" Mayu clapped her hands together. "What can we play..." Mayu looked around the room. "Truth or Dare?"

Yukari raised her eyebrows. "Don't we need a lot more people for that?"

"I don't want to play that," said Ia. "It'll take up too much time."

"Fine," said Mayu with a sigh. "I guess you two can be not fun, then." She got up to her feet. "I'm going to go get some cake from the fridge."

"Sounds good," said Yukari, smiling. After Mayu left the room, Yukari turned towards Ia. "Hey, I was thinking. Last time..." Yukari's voice became more unsure, but she continued talking. "Last time, when we watched movies, that...didn't end up so well. But I still want to introduce you to them. We never got to watch _3-Iron! _Are you...still willing to watch movies with me?"

Ia blinked. After how badly last time ended, she was surprised Yukari was even giving her a second chance. But the way things are now, Ia was willing to jump at anything Yukari offered. "I...sure. When?"

"Whenever you're free," said Yukari. "And really? You're okay with it?"

"Um...yeah," said Ia. "I mean..." she fidgeted. "We talked about this before."

"I know! I promise I won't overstep your boundaries. Just...let me know what's okay."

Ia bit her lip as she thought back to the last time they watched movies. Yukari had been awfully close that time. She wondered if she would react any differently now to Yukari's presence...but considering her crush, probably not. If anything, it'd all be worse considering how Ia now knew what she felt. "Yeah. Of course."

"That's great!" Yukari jumped up to her feet. "Ia, you're the best! Can I hug you?"

Ia remembered how she couldn't even bring herself to hold Yukari's hand earlier. She really had to get over this aversion. Otherwise, how could she be there for Yukari? "Y-yeah, that's fine."

"Alright," Yukari laughed as she bounded over and wrapped her arms around Ia in a tight hug. Ia swallowed as she breathed in the scent of Yukari's floral shampoo, her hands growing clammy as her heart beat faster. Yukari was so warm...it was only for an instant though, Yukari pulling back quickly, her face lit with a bright smile. "Thanks."

Ia felt her face heat up and she looked away. The warmth of Yukari's body was fading away, ephemeral. "You don't need to thank me for that."

"Of course I do," said Yukari. "I know how hard it is for you, so it makes it even more special."

"Anyone want some cake?" said Mayu as she walked in, carrying a rollcake. She glanced at Yukari and Ia. "Wow, looks like you two got closer since I left..."

Ia felt her face heat up harder and Yukari quickly moved back to her seat. Shit. She hoped Mayu didn't tip Yukari off to anything. "Mayu!"

"Hmm, what is it, Ia?" Mayu sat herself down at her place at the table. "Both of your faces are red. I suppose that's understandable when a stunning beauty like myself walks in the room offering you all cake, though."

Ia cleared her throat. "A-anyways. Let's get back to English homework."

"Oh...but I want some cake too," said Yukari.

"English homework and cake," said Mayu. "The perfect combination."

-o-o-o-

The cake was finished at 11:45. The homework followed at midnight. Mayu had excused herself once the cake was finished to wash the dishes, and the sound of water running and dishes clanking could be heard from the kitchen.

"I know I already said this a lot, but...thanks for the cake and the homework help!" said Yukari as she packed her things away. "I guess I should get going now."

Ia frowned as she looked up at the clock. "It's late...you can stay over if you want."

"Wow, thanks," Yukari laughed. "But I don't have any of my things, and I have school tomorrow. My parents would be suspicious, you know?"

Ia had no idea why Yukari's parents would be suspicious of her staying over at Ia's house, but Yukari didn't sound like she was about to take Ia up on her offer. "Oh...uh, then I could walk you back home-"

"Really, it's fine," said Yukari. "I inconvenienced you enough for one night."

"It's not an inconvenience at all," Ia said. "I'm..." Ia looked down. "I'm your friend. I'm here to help you with your problems." She hoped Yukari would pick up on the subtext of that statement.

"It's good to have people to rely on when you're stuck on homework," said Yukari with an oblivious smile. "We're still down for watching _3-Iron_, right?"

"Yeah."

"Great!" Yukari clapped her hands together. "It's an interesting movie, kind of weird. I really hope you like it." She walked over to the kitchen and poked her head in. "I'm gonna go now, Mayu. Thanks for the cake!"

Mayu said something unintelligible back. Ia walked Yukari over to the front door, her mind spinning. Even though she spent more time with Yukari today, Ia felt as though all that happened was that she ran into a wall in her relationship with the girl. How could she get Yukari to open up to her? Every time Yukari mentioned something that she seemed troubled by, she would always change the subject. But Ia didn't want that. She wanted to help her, get to know her...but how? Yukari was so bright. She always seemed to try to keep herself in a good mood. The only time she didn't was the time when they watched movies together. They were nearing the front door now. Did Yukari subconsciously not trust Ia because of that movie incident? But she told her it was okay. The fact that they were going to watch a movie again soon should be proof of that. How did Yukari act with the others after the movie incident anyways? Ia tried to remember, but they were already at the front door, and Yukari was already turning towards her...and here Ia was, alone despite being with Yukari, remote despite Yukari physically being _right here_. Ia had to do something, and she could only think of one thing. She clenched her hands into fists. She had to get over this aversion to touch. Touch was connection.

"Well," said Yukari, "thanks for everything again. I had fun, even though it's just homework. We should do this again sometime!"

"Yeah," said Ia, forcing a smile on her face. "Definitely." Shit. What could she do? Yukari was already leaving. It was too late to do anything right now. Ia's mouth felt dry. What was _wrong_ with her? This came so easily to everyone else.

"I'll see you tomorrow, then," said Yukari, turning the doorknob, fast, too fast. "Bye!"

And then, she was gone. Ia groaned, leaning against the wall, hand against her head.. There went her chance. Gone. Stupid, Ia's mind mocked. How could she expect to get close to Yukari if she couldn't even do something so simple as hugging her goodbye? Maybe it's hopeless. Why would Yukari ever want to confide in Ia when she had other friends, better friends, _normal_ friends? Now that Ia thought about it, Yukari had told SeeU about what happened during the movie night. That was it then. Ia's hand dropped from her face. Why would Yukari ever confide in Ia when she already had SeeU there to tell everything to? The one thing Ia had was that SeeU was far away, in another town. But knowing Yukari, she'd probably try to get SeeU down to visit her. And then where would Ia be?

It would be just like the fair with Mayu, but a hundred times worse. Ia sunk down to the floor and buried her head in her hands. Every beat of her heart hurt. She wasn't even good friends with Yukari. Her crush now seemed all the more pathetic when viewed in that light. Yukari was Ia's only friend. But then...what was Ia to Yukari?

Ia didn't want to think about it. All she could do was wish that SeeU never visited.

-o-o-o-

Yukari breathed in the crisp country air as she stepped out of Ia's house. The streets were completely deserted, the moon a fingernail clipping hung in the sky. The only sounds she could hear were the chirping of crickets and the crunch of her shoes against the ground. It was a far cry from the bustle of brightly lit Artech, and a farther cry from the bustling city of Crypton. Her parents had told Yukari that their final move would be here, but there wasn't very much to do in the country compared to the cities Yukari was used to.

Yukari stretched and checked her phone, which she had turned off upon her arrival at Ia's house to prevent distractions when doing her homework. No texts. No missed calls, either. Yukari sighed. She had hoped that maybe SeeU would try to contact her after abruptly hanging up earlier, but maybe she was just too angry to. Yukari bit her lip. Maybe if she told SeeU that she would be easing up on asking her for homework help, she would feel better, or at least be reassured that Yukari wouldn't be bothering her all the time.

Still, Yukari didn't want to lean on Ia for homework help too much. If she did...Ia might think she was stupid for not understanding the homework. At the same time, SeeU got so annoyed earlier that Yukari wasn't sure if she was still willing to help her with her homework. In other words, Yukari had absolutely no idea what to do. She sighed. Who knew that something as simple as asking for homework help would be so hard? If only there was a cheat code for life so that she wouldn't have to deal with this.

At least there was the upcoming movie night with Ia to look forward to. Yukari brightened up a little at the thought of it. Despite the mistakes she made last time, Yukari hoped that she was more mindful of Ia's boundaries now. Still, Ia was so cute that it was hard to resist hugging the girl at every available opportunity. In retrospect, Yukari thought she did a good job reining her impulses in.

At any rate, Yukari decided to call SeeU to apologize about overstepping her boundaries. Being preoccupied with Ia was no excuse to treat her friend badly. The phone rang twice before SeeU answered it.

"Hello?"

"Hey, it's Yukari, uh..." Yukari paused. "Sorry, did I wake you up?"

"No, no. What is it?"

"Well...I wanted to call because, um, you sounded upset and you hung up really fast last time...I'm really sorry if I annoyed you by asking you for homework help too much! I didn't realize that it was bothering you, you could have said anything at any time and-"

"What?" said SeeU, her voice baffled. "What are you talking about?"

"Huh?" Did SeeU forget? "You remember us talking earlier, right?"

"Of course I remember," said SeeU. "It's just...what are you talking about? I told you I wasn't mad."

Yukari was beginning to feel discomfited. "Um, but you hung up pretty quick, and you sounded annoyed, so I was worried."

"That had nothing to do with homework! Honestly. I told you I had to watch the next episode of _Running Man_, right? But," SeeU's voice shifted from annoyed to teasing, "were you really worried enough about this to call me about this so late? Wow...I'm touched. I didn't know you cared that much."

Yukari heaved a sigh. "Geez, SeeU, of _course_ I care. So it's really okay if I ask you for homework help? I know it's more work for you."

"Of course it's okay!" said SeeU. "Did you forget how I got placed first in every exam? Seriously, your little country school is nothing compared to Artech's. Anyways, I can't believe you're worried about this now after all the help you asked from me before. If I wasn't okay with it, I would have told you."

Yukari shook her head. All that worrying for absolutely nothing. Great. "I thought that's what you meant when you told me to ask Ia for help!"

"What? No, I didn't mean anything like that."

"Really? It definitely sounded like it. Well, whatever," Yukari sighed again. "Ia helped me with my homework, so I have it done now."

There was a pause before SeeU spoke again. "Wait...are you outside?"

"Yeah," said Yukari. "I'm walking back home from Ia's place. You know," Yukari glanced around the empty street, "Yamaha is _really_ different from Artech. It's really...country. Like, I told you that before, but it's so _empty_ right now."

"You're walking back from Ia's house?"

"Yeah, I told you she helped me with my homework, right?"

There was another long pause. Yukari furrowed her eyebrows and checked her phone signal. Four bars. She placed the phone back to her ear. "You there, SeeU?"

"Um...yeah," SeeU said. "Yeah, I'm here. Sorry, I was, um, distracted with a thing. So you're walking back from Ia's house?"

Yukari laughed. "SeeU, I told you that like, three times. Yes, I'm walking back from her house."

"So...you two talked a lot?"

"I guess," said Yukari. "We talked about school and movies and stuff. Oh," Yukari brightened up, "Ia even let me hug her! She was so cute!"

There was another long silence. "Is that so."

"Yeah!" Yukari nodded, smiling at the thought of it. "I think that means we're making good progress, right? I was so afraid I scared her off forever. And remember that movie you showed me? _3-Iron?"_

"Of course I remember," said SeeU. "_3-Iron_ is one of my favorite movies."

"I finally got Ia to agree to watch it with me," said Yukari. "It's going to be great, I'm really excited-"

"Really," said SeeU. "I don't remember watching movies with Ia working out so well last time."

Yukari winced. "Yeah...but we've talked about this before. We've moved past that. I think it'll be fine this time, I just need to make sure that I'm, well, keeping distance, I guess."

"Keeping your distance from Ia sounds like a good idea to me."

Yukari sighed. "I told you that Ia's really not that bad of a person. I know the movie thing was...pretty bad, but...still. Besides, it's not like you've been a saint either. What was with searching up her phone number and randomly harassing her?"

"Well...she made you cry! I don't know why you still want to hang out with her," SeeU scoffed. "She didn't sound like some sensitive, shy, artistic soul when I called her, either."

"Well, look at it from her perspective, an unknown number called her from out of the blue and-"

"No, listen to me. She called you weird, and she said you have a boundary problem when in reality _she's_ the one with the boundary problem."

Yukari rubbed her eyes. She had reached her house, but she couldn't very well go in with the conversation like this unless she wanted to wake up her parents. "SeeU, you don't understand."

"You're right," said SeeU. "I really don't."

"Okay," said Yukari, thinking. How could she get SeeU to understand that Ia really wasn't as bad as she thought she was? "How about you come down and visit sometime? I can introduce you to Ia-"

"Uh, no," said SeeU, quickly. "Well, I guess I _might_ be able to find the time to come down and visit you, but I _don't_ want to meet Ia."

"Maybe if you meet her, you'll see that she's really a nice person," said Yukari. The more she thought about it, the better of an idea it seemed. It was understandable that SeeU would have a bad impression of Ia, because her first impression of her was Yukari crying after the unfortunate movie night. SeeU's timing and attitude when calling Ia hadn't been the best either. But if SeeU managed to meet Ia in real life, if they all spent a day together, then SeeU would be able to see that Ia really wasn't as bad as a person as she thought she was. "Yeah. Yeah! That's it!"

"Yukari," said SeeU, "are you serious?"

"Yes! I mean, a train ride down from Artech is...how long is it?"

"It's seven and a half hours. And then I have to transfer to a bus, which is another hour."

"Oh." That was pretty long...not exactly the sort of trip one could make on a weekend whim. "Wait, how did you know the schedule so well? Yamaha's not that well known of a town."

"Um...we had a uh, train study project on small towns recently," SeeU mumbled. "Anyways, I don't want to meet Ia."

"You're only saying that because you don't know her that well," said Yukari, "which is _exactly_ why you should come down and visit. Also, you get to see me! When's your first break?"

SeeU sighed. "In like, a month. And I don't know...are you worth the eight and a half hour trip? I could be spending time with my friends in Artech instead."

Time to turn up the charm. Or at least, as much charm as Yukari could manage over the phone. "But SeeU...imagine the country! Wouldn't it be a nice break from the hustle and bustle of modern city life? Also," Yukari held up a finger even though SeeU couldn't see, "the food here is great because it's close to so many local farms. And there's a monthly arts fair! I went to it with Ia and Mayu once and it was really cool, they had like, a clock garden and everything. You'd love it, I promise! Also,_ I'm_ here, and I'm definitely worth the trip, right?"

There was a long silence. "Maybe," SeeU said. "I won't promise anything."

"I know break is a while from now," said Yukari. "I just want you to get to know her. She's really a great person. I'm sure you'll see it once you actually meet her."

"Um, yeah, whatever," said SeeU. "Hey, I don't know about you, but I have school tomorrow, and it's late."

"Oh," Yukari blinked. "Oh! Right, I do too," she laughed. "Wow, time goes fast. What time is it?"

"It's like, half past one in the morning." SeeU yawned. "I'm going to go to bed now. Night."

"Oh, night! Hey, think about the visit, okay?"

"Yeah, sure," said SeeU, and she hung up.

* * *

**Whew, another update! To be honest, I'm trying to get out as many updates as I can before school starts xDD Heads up that this may/may not be the last update for Degrees Below Zero for some time, unless I manage to get a lot of the next chapter done tomorrow or something.**


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